


We Can't Recover in Silence

by manixzen



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Depression, Friendship, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2020-08-23 20:13:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 41,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20210911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manixzen/pseuds/manixzen
Summary: The war has just ended, and Draco is a mess. He spends most of the summer immediately following the war in the Mind Health ward at St. Mungo's uncertain of his future and, well, everything. Having decided he wants to control his future and figure out who he wants to be in life, he decides to brave going back to Hogwarts to complete his education. He quickly finds that he was not the only one left in emotional and mental shambles.This is a story of healing and growth.***As of November 2019, this project is on hiatus***





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Content warning: Mind the tags. This fic will deal with some heavy issues, particularly early on like a suicide attempt, depression, panic attacks, and self-harm. (It won't be graphic though). Please do not read if you find any of these topics triggering. 
> 
> Eventual Drarry, but it's going to take a few chapters to get there.
> 
> I do not own any characters and have no intent on copyright infringement.

Draco stared up at the blank white ceiling. The ceiling went well with the blank white walls and the blankets that looked like they once had color but that had slowly evaporated away after thousands of cleaning spells. He thought a place that was supposed to help people heal emotionally and mentally should look slightly more cheery than this. Instead, from what Draco had seen so far, the Alphred Mentis Ward for Mind Health was cold, sterile and decidedly uncheerful. It was tucked away down a small hall behind the Janus Thickey Ward, which allowed some privacy and calmness for the admitted patients and a separate lift for those attending out-patient care, allowing them to avoid the chaos of the main halls and lobby of St. Mungos. It was cold both in spirit and temperature, and it was quiet.

Draco sighed and looked down at his wrists. The healers had done their job well and there was no trace of the open slashes from the night before. He found himself even more frustrated that there was no sign of his attempt, no scar to show his inner turmoil.

He was so tired, tired and angry and irritable and sad and full of shame. The emotions whirled around inside him endlessly and he felt like he would never be free of them. They clawed at him from the inside, sometimes one emotion taking over temporarily, other times all of them swirling and fighting for prominence.

Sometimes the anger would cause him to lash out, smash heirlooms in rooms throughout the Manor that had been in disuse for many years and scream at the sky. Other times, the sadness and hopelessness would take over, filling his chest with a heaviness that he felt too weak to carry with him. Sometimes, grief would threaten to swallow him whole. Grief for his father, whom he loved even for all his flaws and failing, grief for Vince, grief for his family and the loss of what it once was. Occasionally, panic rose up seemingly out of nowhere, a hallway he wandered down that held memories he’d rather forget bringing the wave of panic quickly to the surface or nightmares with screams waking him shaking and unable to breathe.

Most of the time, though, there was shame. Shame was the worst of them all. Shame showed him his every failing again and again, like his mother’s old record player, replaying every terrible thing he’d ever done - in the war and before - over and over, skipping over the scratchy broken parts of the memories, but always continuing on.

It didn’t take Draco too long after the Dark Lord moved himself and his band of merry lunatics into the Manor for Draco to realize how big of a mistake it all was. Where he expected to see refined pure-blood culture that would show the Wizarding World once and for all how superior it was, he instead found chaos and cruelty and insanity. Instead of a privileged spot in the elite Wizard ruling class, Draco found himself forced to torture, grovel, and set with impossible tasks. And, in the middle of it all, when Draco began questioning the sanity and beliefs of the Dark Lord and his followers, his beliefs all came down like a house of cards. But, by then it was too late. He had made his bed.

Being on the losing side by that point was a relief; he was well aware that the Dark Lord winning would only mean servitude. He was too tired for anger and hatred by the end and was relieved when Potter finally killed the Dark Lord, freeing them all. But, he hadn’t thought about the after. He knew that no matter what the future brought, a future without the Dark Lord was better, but he hadn’t really thought about what it would mean to have done the things he’d done, to have been on the wrong side.

The Ministry wanted to quickly move past the war and past their own failings and embarrassments as many Ministry employees across all departments were, at a minimum, complicit in much of what led to the war. So, the trials were quickly scheduled. His father was swiftly given 30 years in Azkaban and large fines for reparations. The list of crimes went far beyond what Draco even knew of, and there was enough evidence that his father hadn’t stood a chance at freedom. His mother had not committed nearly the amount or severity of crimes as his father, so with the help of Potter’s unexpected testimony explaining how she assisted him and betrayed Voldemort, in the end, she was sentenced to 5 years house arrest. Draco was surprised to also receive testimony from the Savoir himself, and his wand even personally returned after the trial. He was even more surprised to find himself only sentenced to time served and two years probation. It helped that he had been underage for most of his crimes, and furthermore had been a fairly terrible Death Eater, having been too scared to carry out most of his assignments.

After his trial, his mother and he moved back into the shell that was once his home. Between the damage from the Dark Lord and his followers and the multiple searches conducted by Aurors after their arrests, most rooms were uninhabitable - furniture pulled apart and destroyed, their things seized or scattered. The Malfoy vaults had taken enough of a hit from his father’s fines that redecorating a manor of this size was out of the question.

His mother quietly and stoically closed up the majority of the rooms, limiting their household to just several rooms and their bedrooms. She found pieces of furniture throughout the Manor that were still serviceable and put together enough of a space to be a home for the foreseeable future.

Draco helped her as best he could, learning cleaning and household spells from dusty old books, cleaning the rooms she’d declared their new home, and repairing the furniture that was the least damaged.

When they were done, they were left with a drawing room that held a sitting area and a small table for dining and a second smaller sitting room where his mother had moved a couple of mismatched comfortable wingback chairs and a bookshelf with her favorite Wizarding fiction series and some books on gardening.

The larger sitting room opened up to a small garden that she declared with the right weather charms would be a lovely year round garden. The kitchen needed the least amount of work, since most of the fixtures were built into the space and the house elves had been the only to use the space. His mother looked more concerned in the kitchen than in any of the other spaces. Draco guessed she, like him, was realizing the magnitude of their new situation, as neither of them knew how to cook or do most of the things that were required to take care of a home. Fortunately the home still had cupboards connected to grocery delivery, and they were able to change their orders to include more foods that didn’t require cooking and baking.

Draco was glad that their new home within the Manor was close to one of the rear staircases that was near his bedroom. It had been his one safe space during the war, where he had pretended that none of it was real and that life was as it always had been. He was glad to be surrounded by that one familiar comfort. Somehow, keeping their activities and life contained in that smaller space towards the back of the main wing allowed some feeling of safety and security.

Years prior, Draco would have been mortified to have his manor and home downsized to a measly two rooms, kitchen and bedrooms, but now it felt comforting. In fact, he was certain he had relentlessly tormented Weasley over much the same. But too much had happened since then. The Manor no longer felt like home; it’s halls filled with too many ghosts of memories. The small new space was somewhat comforting, and without house elves, certainly more manageable. He allowed himself to feel something akin to pride when they had completed cleaning and putting together their new space. For a moment, he felt like maybe it would be okay.

But then there was silence and time.

Other than the daily tasks of cooking (or attempting to learn to cook) and some weekly cleaning, there was nothing to do. His mother took to working in the garden, but even then there was only so much that could be done. Their finances were limited enough after the reparations that while they could afford to live for at least a few years on the remains, there could be no unnecessary spending - no additional flowers and plants for the garden, no new books to pass the time.

They had run out of things to say to one another by mid-July and the silence was deafening. He stopped attempting conversation with her, and she with him.

Draco wandered the empty halls. He read and re-read as many books as he could, trying to avoid the thoughts that kept sneaking into his head, reminders of the war, reminders of things he’d done. He would try to convince himself that he wasn’t so terrible; he hadn’t wanted to torture anyone, he wasn’t like the other Death Eaters, enjoying torture and torment. Even Potter had said so at his trial, right?

But when one is lying to themselves, the truth has a way of slipping in, and he knew.

He knew that while he didn’t want to be the one torturing anyone that he had still wanted power. He had wanted muggle-borns to know their place in society (even if he hadn’t quite thought through what that might mean, or how that might come about), and he wanted pure-bloods to rule. He had believed all he had been taught, and he had acted on it, even if mostly only in words. He had hurled insults and supported the pure blood fanaticism that had led to war. He knew he had blood on his hands, even if only in support of those who did want to torture and kill.

And, he knew he had been wrong. The more he saw the maniacal behavior of the Dark Lord and his followers, the more he came to the slow sinking realization that it was bullshit. And, now he had to live with it all, knowing that he had helped bring this about and he had been oh so very wrong. This was the knowledge that kept him up at night, kept his food tasting like dust, and kept his chest tight and heavy. This was the shame that ate away at his soul, as he tried to convince himself that he wasn’t a terrible person, but deep down knowing that he was.

At first, it was just a fantasy.

He fantasized about ending it all. There were no longer any potions in his home that would have been toxic enough thanks to the Auror raids, but just a quick slicing spell and it would be over… he could be done. He could end that clawing pit in his chest and have peace. No more nights tossing and turning as sleep eluded him, or waking up covered in a sheen of sweat, heart racing, recovering from another nightmare. He could just cease to exist. For awhile, even just thinking about it calmed him down a bit, calmed the clawing monster in his chest. But then, as the hours and the days went on, it wasn’t enough. The shame was consuming him, slowly, painfully. And he’d had enough. He knew he was a coward, once again taking the easy way out. He knew it would destroy his mother, so he internally added that to the list of reasons he was a shitty person as he sat in his empty bathtub, fully clothed one warm evening in mid-July.

Feeling a sense of calm for the first time in weeks, he slowly rolled up his sleeves and quietly cast the spells.

***

When Draco blinked awake for a moment he thought he’d succeeded. Everything was bright and white. But as he turned his head slightly and saw two healers in their too bright robes, the older healer was a tall man with a bushy mustache and the younger one was a shorter man, who looked to be only a little older than Draco, with sandy blond hair and a tag on his robes that said “Trainee.” He quickly realized he was in St. Mungos and that, once again, as was certainly the single thread of his pathetic life, he had failed.

The older healer stepped forward and started casting diagnostic spells over Draco, “Mr. Malfoy, I see you are awake. I’m Healer Stewart. How are you feeling?”

Draco blinked, unsure of how to answer that. Angry? Humiliated? Depressed? Like laughing hysterically because he was pretty sure the universe was just fucking with him at this point, given that he couldn’t even kill himself successfully? He stared at the healer’s mustache for a few seconds, unable to form words. Eventually he settled on, “How did I get here?”

“Your mother found you and floo-called St. Mungo’s emergency department. She was unable to bring you here due to her house arrest, but we were able to send someone over to retrieve you,” he said brusquely, “Your wounds have been healed and you were given a blood replenishing potion. Physically, you are healed, but we will be admitting you to the Mentis Ward.”

Draco felt the shame and self loathing creeping up again. Of course his mother found him, who else would he expect to have found him in an empty house with no house elves? He was so stupid, he should have left the house, gone elsewhere. At least spared his mother that.

Healer Stewart continued casting diagnostic spells as a quill and parchment hovered near him, seemingly recording the results. The younger trainee just kept staring at Draco’s side. Draco looked down and realized in a panic that in the short-sleeved hospital robe, his Dark Mark was on full display. Feeling slightly nauseous, he quickly turned his arm over and tried to focus on what was being said. The Mentis Ward sounded vaguely familiar to Draco, but he couldn’t place it, “Mentis Ward?”

“The Alphred Mentis Ward for Mind Healing. You’ll be transferred over to the care of a mind healer” He abruptly ended the diagnostic spell. “It appears you are physically in good health. Dinner will be brought up shortly and then a nurse will move you to the Ward as soon as the paperwork is filed.”

“No, I’m fine. I feel fine. I’ll just go home, I had an accident and am fine,” Draco quickly, realizing he probably just said fine too many times to be entirely believable. He started to get up from the bed; he was going to need to get out of here quickly.

“Mr. Malfoy, sit down. We are not allowed to discharge any patient who may be a threat to themselves or others.”

“I’m not, I’m fine-” He started to stand up, feeling a little dizzy from the sudden movement.

“Either sit down, or I will restrain you to this bed.” Healer Stewart’s tone left no question that he would do just that.

Draco opened his mouth to remind the healer that he was dealing with a Malfoy; how dare he speak to him that way. But then reality came crashing down, and Draco remembered his new reality. He had nothing to bargain with: no fear of his father’s political pull, no money for subtle bribery, no promises of using his family’s clout and power. He’d never felt so powerless and alone. For years, he’d relied almost solely on his family name - to both get himself into and out of different positions. Now, there was nothing. He sat back down unable to come up with any argument to sway the healer.

“Your dinner should be up shortly. Try to eat, the blood replenishing potion can cause low blood sugar for the next 24 hours and food will help,” Healer Stewart said matter of factly as he rolled up the parchment and he headed towards the door. “Use the call lever next to your bed if you need anything from the nurse. Oh, and an alarm will be placed on this room that will go off if you try to leave.”

Healer Stewart quickly walked out of the room, clearly on his way to his next patient, and the trainee healer quickly scurried off behind him.

Draco sank into his bed. Fuck.

***

“A mind healer will see you in the morning for an initial intake interview. After that, you will be assigned a mind healer who you will meet with several times a week. You will also attend group therapy in the morning. Meals are taken in the dining area, just down the hall, with the other patients on this ward,” the nurse rambled through the details while writing something on a piece of parchment on his clipboard.

He was probably ten years older than Draco and looked tired, like he was at the end of a long shift, with slight black circles under his brown eyes and slightly disheveled dark brown hair. The name badge on his robe said Taynor. From a look at the window in his room, Draco guessed that it was probably the middle of the night.

“You have your own bathroom here with a shower, and there are spare robes in the drawer there,” the nurse waved his hand towards a small dresser with two drawers next to his bed. “If you need anything else, there is always someone at the nurses station - out your door and then turn right.”

“I’m allowed to leave the room?” Draco asked.

“Yes. You are restricted to the ward, and your wand is locked up for the duration of your stay here, but you are free to move around the ward. We request that you stay in your room at night, though, unless there is a problem. It will be important for you to sleep and to maintain a schedule while you are here.” Nurse Taynor stopped writing and looked up at Draco finally and his look softened. “I know this is a lot, but try to get a little sleep before tomorrow. We can go over the rest of what you need to know in the morning.”

Draco nodded.

“If you need anything, I’ll be at the nurses station until my shift is over in an hour, but someone will be there at all times.”

“Thanks,” Draco said quietly. Nurse Taynor nodded his head once and left. Draco stared up at the all white, blank ceiling, wondering how he’d gotten himself in this mess. Then the shame started creeping its way back up. His mother found him. He wondered if he’d be able to write her while here. He wondered if she even knew he was okay. Gods, what was he thinking? He’d never be able to face her again after this. It would be complete and total proof that he was nothing but a coward; she’d be so disappointed in him. A Malfoy was supposed to be above this. Then, he wondered if she’d want to hear from him after this at all. He felt choked with the shame and embarrassment of it all. Draco curled up on his side and cried himself to sleep.

***

“Mr. Malfoy?” Draco slowly opened his eyes to see someone gently knocking on his open door. He slowly woke up, feeling confused, until the memories of the last 12 hours rushed into him. The soft calm grogginess was almost immediately replaced with panic and dread.

The healer walked into his room and pulled the single chair slightly closer to Draco’s bed. She looked to be about his mother’s age, with soft brown hair and a kind face. Draco sat up and arranged his blanket and sheets, feeling immediately awkward and vulnerable to be talking to yet another person while in bed and a flimsy and short St. Mungo’s issued robe.

“I’m Healer Jenson, one of the mind healers on this ward.” She extended her had to greet him, and he shook it briefly.

She gave him a small smile and asked, “How are you feeling this morning?” There was that question again. How exactly was one supposed to feel after a failed suicide attempt? Draco shrugged rather than trying to figure out what to say.

“I have some questions for you and will need to go through your medical history and family history. I know this can be difficult and uncomfortable to talk about, but it’s important for your care that you answer as honestly as you can, okay?”

Draco nodded. Last night, he would have sworn on every Malfoy ancestor that it was an accident and tried to lie his way out of this, had the other Healer even let him say more than two words about it. But this morning he was just feeling tired. He was just so tired of all of it that he didn’t even think he had the energy to pretend he was fine anymore.

“You were admitted last night, having used cutting spells on your wrists. Was this your first attempt at ending your life?” She had a parchment and quill, but continued to look at Draco kindly as she asked questions.

Draco still couldn’t find his voice, but he nodded again. He just didn’t care enough to lie or try to bargain his way out of this situation anymore. Really, though, what did it even matter at this point? Better to stay here than go home and face his mother’s disappointment, at any rate. He felt another pang of guilt thinking about his mother and quickly pushed it back down. Other than the small niggling feelings of shame whenever he thought about his mother, he just didn’t care anymore. Really, none of it mattered.

“Have you thought about taking your life before?”

Draco nodded again.

“How often did you have these thoughts?”

He paused and then replied honestly, “Every day.” He looked around at the room, taking in the slightly worn painting of wildflowers on the wall.

“And when did this start?”

Draco continued to stare at the wildflowers slightly waving in their painted form, back and forth. He just wanted to sleep. Maybe he could sleep here. They’d keep him locked up and he could just stay in this bed and sleep. He wondered how long they’d let him stay, a month? Two? The bed wasn’t quite as comfortable as his one at home, but it would do.

“Mr. Malfoy?”

“What?” He looked at the Healer confused.

“How long have you been having thoughts of taking your own life?” she repeated her question.

He frowned, “I don’t know. A month, maybe?”

“Have you found yourself feeling hopeless?”

Draco nodded again, and looked back at the faded flowers.

“Can you tell me about that more?”

Why was she still here? Surely they had enough information to let him stay. Draco tried to pull himself back to the conversation. He never remembered feeling so tired before. “I just… I’m not sure any of it matters any more.”

Healer Jenson continued to look at him, gently prodding him to continue.

“It doesn’t matter,” he replied flatly. She continued to look at him, hoping for more information. Draco had nothing more to say. It’s not like she would even understand… or care. Who cared what happened to a Death Eater anyways?

The healer finally sighed quietly. “Mr. Malfoy,” she said softly, “we will work on addressing the reasons you have wound up here in one-on-one therapy, but for now, I will say that you will need to spend some time here. As the healer last night assessed, and I am in agreement with, you are currently a risk to yourself, and we cannot discharge you until we believe you are no longer in danger.”

Draco barely looked at her, unsure of whether he had ever cared about anything less. Healer Jenson, rearranged her parchment on her clipboard and continued, “Ok, let’s get your family history.”

Draco answered the questions about his family and personal health histories, relieved to not be asked any more difficult questions that he didn’t know how to answer. As the conversation continued, he continued to further convince himself this was for the best here. He could rest here. He felt himself starting to relax and feel relieved to be out of the Manor.

“Alright, that’s it for now. You will be assigned to Mind Healer Smyth and will meet with him for one hour a day, several days a week for individual therapy therapy. He will determine if any potions will be of assistance in your case, and will determine your plan of care for your stay here.” Healer Jenson stated, unclipping the parchment and rolling it up. She gave him a small smile, “I’ll send in a nurse to get you started with your schedule for the day. Healer Smyth won’t be available until this afternoon, but you can still attend group this morning.” She stood up and started for the door.

“Wait- Healer, my mother. Do you know if she knows? I mean, does she know I’m okay and that I’m staying here?” Draco asked. He felt obligated to do at least that, ensure she knew he was alive at the very least. Even if she never wanted to talk to him again, he could at least make sure she wasn’t sitting at home, trapped, not knowing what happened.

“I’m not sure, but I will find out and make sure that she has been informed. She is on house arrest, yes?”

Draco nodded, certain that while everyone was acting surprisingly professional, they knew all the details of his family’s fall.

The healer put her hand on Draco’s shoulder and gave him a soft smile, “I’ll make sure she knows you are okay.” Draco released a large breath. He felt like that was his last loose end tied up. He wouldn’t have to worry about her and he could rest.

“Thank you.”

***

Group was mostly uneventful, but Draco knew immediately he hated it. He spoke as little as possible and tried to sink into his chair.

The reality of being admitted into a Mind Healing ward was finally settling in, and Draco was feeling uncomfortable in his skin, ashamed and embarrassed. And just adding to the humiliation, he sat in group and realized that everyone else seemed to have normal clothing or pajamas on, and he was still in his flimsy too short St. Mungo robe. Healer Jenson had explained that the groups would be run by a Mind-Nurse, a nurse with specialized mind healing training that were also certified therapists. She introduced herself as Kat. She mostly just oversaw that the group didn’t get too off track and asked questions to get everyone talking every once in awhile.

He mostly let his thoughts drift as others talked and cried and talked some more. He just wanted to go to his bed and go back to sleep. So far, instead of finding rest, he was finding himself in one uncomfortable situation after another.

He sighed loudly, causing a few people to look over at him. Draco sat up a little bit straighter in the chair, not wanting to call attention to himself. He took the time to look around at the other patients.

There were about 11 other patients in the circle, the ward seemed bigger than that, so he wasn’t sure if everyone participated or maybe if there was more than one group that met. There were a few older wizards and witches that seemed, well, crazy. He knew that was a bit hypocritical given his current position, but a few of them seemed genuinely unhinged and weren’t making a whole lot of sense. He immediately and overwhelmingly felt like he didn’t belong there when one of the older wizards started ranting about the Muggle spies that were infiltrating the Ministry.

To his left was a younger woman, maybe a couple years older than Draco, with stringy blond hair. She hugged her knees to her chest and looked like she also wanted to disappear into her chair. Like Draco, she also barely spoke throughout group. A few seats over from her was a man who looked to be about 30 years old, with auburn hair and a stutter. He seemed to have extreme anxiety about, as far as Draco could tell, everything. Across from Draco in the circle was an older woman with a purple cardigan over her pajamas that looked handmade and on her collar sat a broach of a butterfly. It seemed she’d lost her son in the war and was severely depressed; she had stopped getting out of bed and her other son had brought her in for help. Draco couldn’t look her in the eye, and made sure his arm was tightly crossed against his chest for the remainder of group.

It seemed there was a daily schedule that everyone was expected to adhere to, when capable. Free time in the morning before breakfast, then group, and then an hour of reading time in the library. After which, they had outdoor recreation time, which was not quite accurate as it was in a room two doors down from the library that had been charmed to replicate a garden, both in size and weather. After rec time was lunch, where they all dined together at round tables that fit about five people each in the dining room on the ward. After lunch, it was much the same except instead of group therapy, they had art therapy that seemed to rotate through things like art, music, and crafts.

Just one pointless thing after another, all keeping Draco from his bed.

As the day progressed, Draco became increasingly irritable as he was forced to cycle through all these bullshit activities. He just wanted to sleep. He wanted to go back to his bed and curl up in a ball and stay there for a year, being forced into activity after activity was grating on every nerve ending.

He mentally kicked himself for thinking he could rest here and not fighting harder to keep from being admitted. He was also becoming increasingly convinced this was all a big mistake, and he didn’t belong there. Sure, he’d slit his wrists, but it was obviously just a bad day. He wasn’t crazy and he certainly wasn’t like everyone else here.

Fortunately, just as he was about to throw his paintbrush at the overly chipper art therapy teacher, a nurse approached him and informed him his mind healer was ready to meet with him.

Draco followed the nurse down the stark white hallway away from the public spaces towards another white stark hallway that led to the rest of the hospital. Other than the occasional faded landscape painting on the walls that differed, every space in this ward nearly looked the same in it’s blankness and sterility. As they got towards the end of the hallway, there were a few doors along the side of the hall that, according to the various nameplates, seemed to house the offices for the mind healers on staff.

The nurse gestured to an open door, and Draco entered. There was a middle aged man with a greying beard sitting behind a large slightly beat up mahogany desk. Draco heard the door softly click behind him as the nurse left. The healer in front of him wore soft brown robes instead of the annoyingly bright lime-green robes the other healers usually donned. He looked up from behind his bifocals and gave Draco a smile.

“Mr. Malfoy, I presume?” he asked.

“Yes.” Draco answered and sat down in the chair across from the desk.

“I’m Healer Smyth.” He put out his hand, leaning slightly across the desk. “May I call you Draco?”

Draco nodded and shook his hand, and then asked abruptly, “How long am I going to be here?”

“That depends on you and how much progress you make, Draco.”

“This was a mistake. I don’t think I should be here.”

“Okay. Why don’t you think you should be here?”

“I’m not… I’m not crazy. And, I don’t think I need any of this. I was just feeling a bit off, but I’m feeling much better now. This hasn’t happened before and I’m fine. I really don’t think I need any of this. I need to go home.” All of the irritability and frustration that had been building all day came rushing out. Draco cringed internally realizing he didn’t sound very convincing. He was feeling so agitated, feeling like his skin was crawling, and he was having a hard time keeping his emotions in check.

“What hasn’t happened before?” Healer Smyth asked gently.

“You know... All of it. Just I’m fine now, and I think this was a mistake. I am not even that sad right now, and really, I should get home to my mother. She shouldn’t be left alone. Plus I think I’ll do better at home, you know,” he continued to ramble.

“I understand this is hard for you. How are you feeling right now? Try to be honest and just say what comes to mind.”

Was he serious? How was he feeling? Oh, just peachy, locked in a ward with a whole bunch of crazy people and not being allowed to just rest. He tried to get his irritation under control, as he didn’t think yelling at the Mind Healer was his ticket out of this gods-awful place. Draco paused, trying to consider what might be the right answer. The answer that would get him out of here and home.

“There’s no right answer, Draco, just tell me what you are feeling right now,” Healer Smyth smiled, seeming to read his mind.

“Really I’m fine.” Draco attempted to pull himself together and look less agitated.

“Mr. Malfoy, believe it or not, I am quite used to patients telling me what they think I want to hear.” Healer Smyth looked over his glasses, not unkindly.

Draco’s mind whirled trying to come up with a plan to convince the healer that he should be discharged. Never before had he been so acutely aware that he’d almost solely relied on his family name to manipulate situations. Some Slytherin he was, he couldn’t manipulate his way out of a paper bag without relying on his father’s name. Every start of an idea he quickly realized would no longer work - not with his father in prison, his mother locked in their home, their vaults drained. Fuck.

Draco took a deep breath and decided for a little bit of honesty - since Smyth seemed to see through everything else, anyways. Maybe if he was just honest about how he was feeling, but explained that he wasn’t going to try to off himself again they’d let him go. Surely they needed his room for more pressing cases - the actually crazy people. “I’m agitated, and I don’t know… irritated and maybe a little angry.”

“Ok good, why do you think you are feeling those things? What do you think is agitating you right now? Or what are you angry about? Right now.”

Draco huffed. Again, with the feelings. Why did everyone care so much what he was feeling at every second? He tried to school his features. He had never been particularly good at the whole pure-blood emotionless facade, as his emotions always seemed to get the better of him.

“I don’t know.”

“Just try, just say whatever is on your mind.”

“I don’t want to be here.”

“Ok good, what else?

“I don’t know! I don’t know what you want from me!”

“I just want you to be honest.”

“Okay, well I _honestly_ don’t want to be here right now.”

“I can understand that. Can you tell me a bit about what has been going on before you got here? What has been on your mind? How your summer has been going.”

“I’ve been feeling like shit - that’s how.” Draco felt his temper getting the better of him. “I feel pissed off and miserable and guilty! How else would my summer be going?” He was yelling at this point.

“I’m in this weird place with all these crazy people! And I- I don’t know! I don’t want to be here, but I don’t want to be home. I don’t want to be anywhere right now, because it feels like shit no matter where I am. And I’m a terrible fucking person so why are you even bothering with me! Do you even know the things I’ve done? Who I am? It doesn’t fucking matter how I feel. None of it even matters anymore!” He glared at his healer, panting slightly from the outburst.

When the healer said nothing in response, Draco groaned, oh gods, why did he just say all that? He dropped his head into his hands. Draco felt like his chest was going to split open. He didn’t want to talk about any of it. He didn’t want to let these feelings creep out of the dark and suffocate him. He’d been trying to push them down for too long. And, he certainly didn’t want to give anyone more reason to keep him locked up here.

“Ok, that’s a lot to unpack, and we’ll have time to go through all of this while you are here. But I want to start with one question. Do you think people can change?” Healer Smyth looked at Draco over his bifocals.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s a simple question, do you think people can change?”

“I suppose. Yes.”

“Do you think you can change?”

“I don’t know” Draco felt that shame creep back in, and that voice in his head he was trying to ignore remind him that he was still a terrible person.

“You said you are a ‘terrible person.’ If you had the chance to do those things again right now, as you are today, would you make the same decisions?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I would! I don’t know!” Draco felt like he couldn’t breathe.

“Ok, Draco. Let me tell you what I think then. I think you feel guilty, and that guilt is eating you alive. I realize that you have survived a lot in the past year, but I think your depression is most likely rooted in how you feel about yourself. You are turning all of your guilt and anger in on yourself. That can’t be easy.” Draco chanced looking up at Healer Smyth and found him gently smiling at him. Why would this healer even care if Draco was miserable? He deserved it didn’t he?

Healer Smyth continued, “While you are here, we can work on that. We can work on how you feel about yourself and who you want to be. You aren’t set in stone, Draco. You aren’t finished at eighteen. If you don’t want to be who you are, then change.”

Draco was exhausted. He just wanted to go back to his bed, ideally at home, and sleep away his life. But he had a sneaking suspicion after that outburst, he wasn’t going anywhere soon.

Healer Smyth continued to ask him questions about recent events in Draco’s life, how he had been feeling this summer at the Manor, how he thought about himself. Draco considered asking him again how long he would be kept there, but then he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer anymore. The exhaustion he had been feeling last night and that morning came back and he just wanted to go back to his hospital room and crawl into bed.

As Draco stood up at the end of his session, he thought to ask, “Healer? How can I get some clothes?”

“Generally family or friends can bring clothes when they visit,” Healer Smyth replied.

“Oh, right.” Draco realized that he would be in this gown for the foreseeable future, and turned to leave.

“Draco, wait. I will see if I can find something for you. We have a donation bin downstairs for patients that are in need; I may be able to get something from that for you.” Healer Smyth seemed to realize that Draco would have no one to visit him here.

Draco nodded, “Thank you,” feeling simultaneously grateful for the help and ashamed at how far he’d really fallen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Made some revisions after finding some wonderful betas to help with feedback. Thank you Silver_Ivy, Rythana and jaalsgf!


	2. Chapter 2

After his first week in Mentis, and three sessions with Healer Smyth, Draco came to a decision. He wanted to try - try to live, try to get better, to feel better. He wasn’t sure he could change - not really. But, he thought maybe he could be less depressed, find something in life that made it worth living. He was still exhausted most of the time, and just wanted to sleep.

The schedule of activities was a special form of torture, seemingly designed to keep him from his bed. He still had barely been participating in group or the weird art/music/dance therapy sessions in the afternoons, but his one-on-one therapy had been progressing. They had been slowly discussing harder things: the war, his father, his upbringing, his behavior at school, his role in the war, things that happened at his house during the war.

With Healer Smyth’s encouragement, he finally wrote to his mother, trying to breathe through the feelings of guilt and shame that threatened to overwhelm him. He had half convinced himself that she was so ashamed of him that she wouldn’t write back, when he received a letter during morning mail call. Owls were not allowed to directly deliver to the patients, and had to be checked for dangerous items (or items patients could make dangerous) before being delivered. He took the letter from the hospital orderly who was handing out mail, fearing the worst. He went to his room to read her letter in private.

_Dearest Draco,_

_I am so relieved to hear from you. I was glad to hear from St. Mungo’s that you would be staying in their care for the time being. I know I do not express it often, but I love you. I know how hard these past few years have been for you and our family. I want only the best for you. You need not worry about me—I am keeping myself busy with the garden and corresponding with a few friends. I only worry about you. Please write again soon, and I hope you are finding the help you need._

_With love,_

_Mother_

Draco quietly wept, clutching the letter in his hands. He didn’t realize how much he had pulled away from his mother, his only family left to him now. He’d isolated himself, as had she, when they were both still at the Manor. Both silently and separately dealing with their grief and pain. He felt the weight of all the wrong assumptions he had made lift off his shoulders and felt he could breathe just a little bit easier now.

***

As his second week progressed, Draco worked at his therapy, learning as much as he could about depression, grief, trauma and anxiety. He started to open up during therapy and share his thoughts. He never felt judged by Healer Smyth, and it felt surprisingly nice to have someone to talk to.

He hadn’t had anyone to talk to for so long; it would have been insane to discuss his feelings or thoughts about the Dark Lord’s plans or any of the stuff going on in the Manor for the past few years. And, really, he’d never had the kind of relationships that leant themselves to confessions and honesty in the first place. His childhood friends, who eventually became his Slytherin classmates, were all cut from the same cloth. They’d been taught at an early age that information was a form of power, and to guard their own secrets carefully. Now, adrift from upbringing and pure-blood subculture, Draco found himself feeling relieved that he didn’t need to watch everything he said, mask his emotions, constantly lie or bend the truth. He was just too tired for all of it. His mind healer was kind and patient and allowed him to take his time and work through his feelings and thoughts as they came up.

Draco was given a potion regimen to start breaking through his depression and panic attacks, with the understanding he would most likely not be on them forever, but they were there to help him. He would still have to do the work though, Healer Smyth was quick to remind him.

He couldn’t tell if the potions were helping, or if it was the therapy, but he started to feel the fog of depression lifting. While he still didn’t enjoy the majority of the activities he was forced into daily, he no longer felt the pull of his bed and solitude as he had when he first arrived. And, while his anxiety was still ever present, it was softer around the edges—slowly releasing its clutches from his chest.

Draco was also given homework. It differed each time; daily he was to write a list of three things he was grateful for or good things that happened to him that day, no matter how trivial. Other times, he would have an assignment just to complete once, like write a list of the things he didn’t believe anymore. He had divided it up into two columns. One column for things he was sure he didn’t believe (the Dark Lord had any good ideas, or that muggle-born witches and wizards should be stripped of their rights), and the second column for things he wasn’t sure about (Muggles were inferior to Wizards). He was pretty sure from everything he’d seen those past few years that pure-blood, half-blood and muggle-born didn’t matter - a Wizard was a Wizard and a Witch a Witch, but he still found Muggles an unknown entity and he felt uncomfortable with how different they were and found it hard to completely dismiss everything he’d been taught his whole life.

While Healer Smyth seemed convinced that Draco could break through his upbringing and rework his beliefs, Draco was not so convinced.

“So are you saying they don’t all want us dead? There were entire centuries where they burned wizards and witches at the stake! And they, what, suddenly are fine with it? Or is it just because they don’t know about us?” Draco said exasperated. He could admit he’d maybe been wrong about muggle-borns, after all he’d seen in the war (and finding out the Dark Lord had been a half-blood, well, hadn’t that been a surprise?), but this felt like too much.

“Muggle culture, like Wizarding culture, has changed quite a bit since the 14th century, Draco.” Healer Smyth said patiently. “I’m not here to change your mind about anything, I am just saying that you should do your own research. Look beyond what you were taught. You’ve already said how much of what you taught you now realize to be, in your words, “bullshit.” So why not keep investigating? Find out for yourself what you believe.”

“And how do you propose I do that?” Draco asked, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Shall I wander into a Muggle area and just start asking them questions. Say, you there, if you found out someone was a witch would you be inclined to burn them at the stake? Or is magic fine by you folks now?”

“How about we start with something a little less likely to end up with you on a Ministry watch list for breaking the Statute of Secrecy?” Healer Smyth replied as he stood up and headed towards one of his many bookshelves. He ducked down and started pulling some old paperback books off a lower shelf.

“Why don’t you read a few books to start?” he said, as he handed over the books to Draco. Draco. Draco looked at the covers: _The Three Musketeers, The Fellowship of the Ring, Pride and Prejudice._

“I tried to give you a wide variety,” the healer said with a glint in his eye. “Let me know what you think once you’ve read them and when you are ready to talk about them.”

Draco restrained from rolling his eyes, just barely, and nodded. He’d read the bloody books, for all the good they’d do.

***

“I just feel like I can’t breathe. Like the air is being sucked out of me.” A new patient, Draco was pretty sure his name was Jim or John or something, was fidgeting as he talked to the group. “Everytime I see a flash of red, it reminds me of the spell that took my Melinda, and I just freeze up and I can’t breathe. Everything gets fuzzy and I start shaking, it’s like I’m not even in my body any more.”

Draco knew that feeling well. Furthermore, sitting in a therapy group where the vast majority of the patients were dealing with the fall out from the war, the war he was complicit in, was triggering those same feelings. He felt like he was on the verge of a panic attack just sitting down for morning group. He saw them look at him askew, as if waiting for him to start yelling out curses at any muggle-born or half-blood in the ward. Every time he considered participating in group, he pictured the group as a whole yelling him down that he didn’t deserve to be there, that it was his fault that half of them were there in the first place, trying to recover from the war.

He also caught a few other patients sneaking glances at his arm, even though it was now always covered by a faded navy blue hoodie from the donation bin - a Muggle clothing item that, if asked, he would have said was the most atrocious piece of clothing ever to have been created, but secretly he loved and rarely took off.

“What strategies have you been working on for when you feel like that, John?” The Mind-Nurse, Kat, asked.

“I can’t do anything when it’s like that! I don’t have control!” John’s leg was shaking faster now as he was clearly getting worked up talking about it.

“Okay, what about anyone else? Has anyone else ever felt this way?” Kat looked pointedly at Draco, who looked down at his lap but felt her stare lingering on him for long enough to be uncomfortable.

He looked up and cleared his throat, “Um, yeah. I get panic attacks, have been for a few years actually.”

“Thank you for sharing, Draco. Do you have any strategies that you’ve used to help with them?”

She knew damn well he did because she’d been the one to teach him them when he nearly blacked out in the middle of the lounge from a panic attack a few days prior.

He cleared his throat again, wishing for the floor to swallow him up, anything but to have to talk about this with these strangers, “I do breathing exercises and count my breaths. And, try to learn what my triggers are.”

“Good, thank you. Anyone else?” Kat gave Draco a small smile as they continued on. No one yelled at him for being a Death Eater or for it being his fault; once again, his assumptions being far worse than the reality. This was what Smyth kept calling catastrophizing; his brain would take the worst case scenario, sometimes likely, but often not and grab ahold of it. He let out a deep breath.

Draco wandered into the library later that day during reading time. He had finished the Muggle fiction over the past week. He was more confused than ever from that book selection. The one took place in France and was full of action and adventure, romance and deception. That book had been a quick read and, loathe as he was to admit it, kind of fun. He’d found himself quickly swept up in the mystery and adventure of the four friends.

The next book he’d read had been about relationships, romance, friendships and family. While there were parts of the books that felt unfamiliar and foreign to him, with the Muggle traditions and culture, there were as many parts that felt familiar: familial obligations, the need to marry well, society and expectations.

The final book found him totally and utterly confused. There were magical beings that he’d never heard of and wizards. Wizards! How did that book not break the Statute? Granted, they had many details wrong and the whole story seemed to take place in some distant past in a land that he was pretty sure didn’t exist. He wanted to know why Smyth chose that book - were Muggle really fine with Wizards? Did they actually write about them?

He didn’t know what to believe anymore and it was still disconcerting. He still wasn’t sure Muggles didn’t want to kill them all, or many of the other things he’d been taught to believe.

He needed a break from Muggle fiction.

He wandered around the library looking through the shelves for something more familiar, safer until he came to the bookcase filled with Mind Health books. He grabbed one called “The Wizard’s Mind” and saw a row of books on the bottom shelf with unfamiliar words, “psychology,” “psychiatry,” “cognitive health.” He picked up “Psychology: A Complete Introduction.” The pages were glossy, and it had an unmoving photograph on the cover. Muggle, then, he thought. Oh, why not? It couldn’t be any stranger than a book about Hobbits and Elves that were the size of people, and clearly didn’t clean houses.

He finished both books quite quickly, using all his reading time, free time and even taking the books with him to the indoor-outdoor garden. He found them fascinating, while the terminology differed, mind healing and psychology shared many of the same theories and tennents. He even was surprised to learn that Muggles had their own types of potions that they took in these small objects they called “pills” to help with things like depression and other mind issues. Unlike the fiction, the Muggle textbooks were logical and well-researched. He found himself developing just a bit of respect for these researchers and authors.

He quickly swapped the two books out for two more books, another wizarding text and another Muggle text. The bookshelf was full of everything from introductory, generalized texts on mind health and psychology to more specific text on issues or illnesses of the mind, and he was slowly working his way through the lot. The more psychology and psychiatry books he read, the more he felt out of his depth, realizing that Muggles had done quite a bit more research and studies on mind healing issues and wonder what else they knew about.

He started reading some of the biology textbooks that were on a little used shelf in the corner of the library, complete with what seemed to be other Muggle school books on Maths and English. He wasn’t sure why they would need English textbooks as he was pretty sure Muggles also spoke English - at least the Psychology textbooks seems to suggest so.

The more distance Draco got from his upbringing, and the more exposure he got to all this different information, the more fascinated he was by Muggles - their science and their technology in particular. He felt betrayed that he’d been taught to believe that they were primitive and unintelligent. He might not have been particularly interested in their culture, or talking to them, but their science was fascinating.

Along with expanding his education far beyond Hogwarts curriculum, he was slowly getting to know some of the other patients. Not all of them; he tried to keep his distance from the patients that seemed physically violent, but even then, he was starting to feel sympathy towards them instead of disgust and realizing that his own issues seemed a bit more manageable by comparison.

The girl with the stringy blonde hair he’d noticed from his first group therapy session was named Nicole. She was depressed and suicidal like him, and perhaps in part because of that, they got along well. She hated the art therapy as much as Draco. They started sitting next to each other so they could quietly make fun of whatever weird thing they were doing that day. She had been admitted to the ward the day before Draco, and as she became more comfortable in the environment, she relaxed and her personality came out more. She had a wicked sense of humor, and it seemed no subject was off limits. She had been at Hogwarts a few years ahead of him, although he didn’t remember seeing her there, and was a Hufflepuff. He’d always thought of Hufflepuffs as a bit goody-goody and was surprised that she could have out-snarked Pansy any day of the week. But, the thing he liked the most about Nicole was she treated him like just another person, not carefully like he was broken and not with distrust because of his past.

The tired nurse from Draco’s first day, Taynor, also turned out to be a decent sort, as were most of the nurses and mind healers. He had a good sense of humor and seemed to know how to catch Draco off-guard when he was starting to ruminate over all the reasons life was terrible and make him laugh. Sometimes even at Draco’s expense. Draco had never had friends who felt the freedom to tease him before, at least not directly, and while it prickled him a bit at first, eventually he realized that was the nurse’s way of showing affection for the patients and lightening the mood a bit. He was always gentle with his teasing when it was with patients, but quite ruthless when making fun of himself or the other staff. It didn’t hurt that Draco also found him quite attractive now that the nurse was better rested, and was harboring a small crush on the man. He knew nothing would happen - that would be beyond inappropriate, but he was just enjoying the feeling of having a crush again. It had been so long. Nothing like a war with a megalomaniac and his groupies shacking up in your house to kill off all feelings of desire.

***

A little over two weeks after his initial admittance to the Mentis Ward, Draco sat in the lounge one morning during free time reading another book on Muggle psychology.

“Malfoy.” Draco looked up to see an orderly doing mail call, holding out a parchment towards him. He frowned and then stood and walked over to get it, confused as to who might be writing him. He’d received a letter from his mother just yesterday. He started opening it as he walked back over to his chair.

_Dear Mr. Malfoy,_

_We are pleased to announce that Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has been repaired and will be open on time for the upcoming school year. As many students' education was interrupted and incomplete during the past school year, we would like to invite you to return to complete your seventh year. Please find an enclosed list of necessary books and equipment. _

_Term begins September 1st. We await your owl no later than August 10th._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Headmistress Minerva McGonagall_

Draco’s hands start shaking as he read the letter, and he felt his breath coming in short bursts. His chest constricted, he wasn’t getting enough air. He kept trying to breathe, trying to draw in air, faster and faster. The room started slowly darkening around him, his hands and arms feeling tingly.

“Whoa there,” Nurse Taynor came over to him, “take a deep breath in and count to two, one… and two… Good now breathe out, one and two… Good, you’re doing good Draco, deep breath in, one… two… three, and out… two… three.” He sounded far away to Draco, but he tried to match the nurse’s counting, as the nurse went to higher numbers. Eventually, Draco’s breath started evening out and his vision went back to normal. His hands were still trembling slightly around the letter.

“How are you feeling?” Nurse Traynor asked, his hand on Draco’s shoulder. He thought it must have been there the whole time.

“Okay. Better, thanks,” Draco breathed out, still trying to keep a handle on his breathing, and feeling dumb that the letter had sent him into yet another panic attack.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

The thought of trying to unpack what just happened nearly started the hyperventilating right up again, Draco shook his head quickly. “No. I have therapy this afternoon, I’ll just… I’ll talk to Healer Smyth later.” He made a small wave like gesture, as if to push away the feelings he was trying to not deal with right then.

Nurse Traynor nodded, “Alright, let me know if you need anything until then?”

“Yes, thank you. Again,” Draco gave him a small smile. As the nurse walked back to his station, Draco quickly folded up the parchment and shoved it in the pocket of his donated hoodie. He would think about that later.

“Bad news?” Nicole plopped down on the seat next to him.

“No, not bad. I… I don’t want to talk about it just yet,” Draco breathed out again, trying to keep a handle on it. He had just been getting comfortable with the idea of going back to the Manor and attempting to finish his basic NEWTs via correspondence, which was notoriously difficult to do without instruction. He doubted there would be many job offers regardless of the status of his NEWTs. But if he returned, there would be a possibility of doing well. He felt the panic starting to creep back in, let out a long breath, later, there would be time to think about all of this later.

“Alright.” Nicole considered him for a moment and then changed the subject. “Did you hear? Today is basket weaving in art ‘therapy.’” She crooked her fingers as she said the word therapy and smiled.

“Basket weaving?” Draco allowed himself a small laugh.

“Because obviously weaving baskets will solve all our problems. I totally want to live now! I have the ability to make my own basket! To put useless stuff in! I’m healed!” Nicole melodramatically exclaimed, leaning back and putting the back of her hand on her forehead.

Draco laughed with her, but didn’t share that even basket weaving sounded more appealing than trying to sort out all his feelings about Hogwarts and his future right now.

***

After a very confusing session of basket weaving - really, though, what could this possibly have to do with his mental health? - it was time for his one-on-one therapy session.

“Good afternoon, Draco, take a seat,” Healer Smyth said, smiling at Draco as he entered the office.

“Afternoon,” he replied, eyes wandered over the dusty books that lined the healer’s wall. Draco wondered if he’d be allowed to borrow any of these once he exhausted the books in the library on mind health.

“How are you doing today?” his healer asked.

“Fine. Except, well not fine. I got a letter from Hogwarts,” Draco pulled the letter out of his hoodie pocket and handed it to his healer. “I’ve been invited back to finish my seventh year.”

“Interesting, and how do you feel about going back?”

“Honestly? Terrible. I had a panic attack in the middle of the lounge after I read the letter.”

“Do you remember what you were thinking or feeling when that happened?” Healer Smyth gently prodded.

“Not exactly, but… I think I thought of all the people that would be there, and what they must think of me. Just the idea of going back there - not only because of everything that happened the last time I was there, there was just so much… death and… it was awful. But also, you know, having to see everyone again, I don’t want to have to see them,” Draco replied, wringing his hands inside his hoodie pocket.

“Who do you picture when you say everyone?”

Draco thought for a minute, “I’m not sure… I think mostly I just picture nameless students glaring at me or cursing me or spitting at me for daring to set foot back. Maybe Professor McGonagall and all the other professors looking at me disapprovingly and with disgust… Granger… I said some pretty terrible things to her, and my aunt… at my house.” Draco shuddered, but continued, “Luna and Dean Thomas, they were both kept in my dungeons, I can’t - how can I face them, and then… Potter and Weasley, but they already hated me anyways.” Draco felt like his throat was closing up.

“Didn’t Mr. Potter testify at your trial on your behalf?”

Draco shrugged, unsure of how to respond to that. He still didn’t understand why Potter did that in the first place.

“If it weren’t for your fear of the other students, and I can’t predict how they will or will not respond to you, would you want to go back to Hogwarts and finish your education?”

“I really don’t know. Every time I try to think of the future I feel like I can’t breathe,” Draco answered.

“Well, then I think perhaps we should talk about that. Sometimes it can be too much to plan it out all at once, but do you have any thoughts for what you might want to do? After you leave here?” Healer Smyth asked.

“Well, immediately, I thought I would return to the Manor with my mother, but after that, no.”

“What did you want to do before the war?”

“I’m not sure I ever was asked what I wanted,” Draco replied with an edge, “I was _expected_ to marry a pure-blood witch, have lots of pure-blooded babies to carry on my lineage and ensure an heir, of course, and to eventually manage my families finances and investments. There was also expectation that I would be powerful and have connections in the ministry, of course.

“Alright, of those things, are there any of those that you want now?”

Draco huffed a laugh, “No, definitely not.”

“Not even marriage and a family?”

“Well, I’m not opposed to a family, perhaps someday, but I have never been interested in witches,” Draco said wryly.

“Are you gay or simply disinterested in relationships?” Healer Smyth asked gently.

“Gay, most definitely.”

“But you would have married a witch, and had, as you said, lots of pure-blooded babies?”

“I never really had a choice,” Draco said matter-of-factly.

“Well, you have a choice now, do you not?”

Draco thought about it. He had been so focused on his ruin that he hadn’t really thought about what any of it meant for all those lifelong expectations. His father had been extremely clear in his expectations of the only Malfoy heir, and Draco never dared to consider any other options. But, as he thought about the possibility, reality came crashing down.

“It won’t matter anyways,” Draco said glumly. “I’m an ex-Death Eater; I doubt I’ll be getting too many offers on any type of marriage. Or, jobs, for that matter.”

“So, you what? You won’t try to do anything because you may find some rejection? Yes, you may even find more rejection than most because of the things you have done, I’m not going to lie to you and say that the next few years will be easy. But Draco, your life is not over at eighteen, regardless of some ill-conceived decisions you made in your youth. And, I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but you aren’t the first young person to have made some fairly terrible decisions that you’ve needed to come back from.” Healer Smyth looked at him intently over his bifocals, and after a beat continued, “alright. For your homework this week, I want you to make a list of anything you think you might be interested in for a career. Pretend that anything is possible - I don’t want you not putting something on the list because you think you might not get it because of your past. Write everything you might be interested in down.”

Draco let out a fairly melodramatic sigh at the idea of yet another list, shoved his hands in the pocket of his hoodie and slouched in his chair in a decidedly un-Malfoyish manner.

***

“What are you doing?” Nicole pulled up a seat next to Draco, putting her elbows on the table and propping up her face in her hands.

“Making yet another list. Apparently I’m going to be cured by lists.” Draco said with irritation.

Nicole laughed, “That’s right, you have Smyth. I’ve heard from Taynor that Smyth is big on lists for everyone—the type of list changes, but it’s always lists.”

Draco smiled, “Well I guess I can take refuge in that I’m not the only one being list-tortured.”

“So what is this list about?”

“My future… any job I can see myself wanting to do, and I’m not allowed to discount something because they won’t hire Death Eaters,” Draco huffed, staring down at the blank parchment.

“Ex.”

“What?”

“Ex-Death Eaters,” Nicole said.

“Fine. ‘Ex’ Death Eaters,” Draco repeated.

“I mean it’s not like you were even good at it,” Nicole needled.

Draco raised an eyebrow and then sighed, “I want to argue with you on principle, but you’re right, and I suppose it’s good that I was yet again unable to live up to my father’s expectation this time.”

Nicole smiled cheekily. “So what are you going to put for all your illustrious future careers?”

“I have no idea. I wasn’t supposed to have a career, I was just supposed to manage money and the Manor, and… I don’t know- be respected and feared,” Draco said with a self-deprecating laugh.

“Ah, yes, the life of the idle rich,” Nicole replied.

“Well as I am now a member of the idle poor, I need a new plan. What about you? What are your plans?”

“I actually came over to talk to you about that. I’m being discharged,” Nicole said.

“What? When did that happen?”

“Just a few minutes ago,” she replied. “I’m leaving tomorrow.”

“Wow - that’s fantastic!” Draco exclaimed, trying to look happy for her and shoving down the feeling of panic of losing his only friend here.

“Thanks,” she smiled broadly.

“That’s really great. So, then what?”

“I’m going to move home to my mum’s for now, you know, not try to take on too much. And then, I guess get a job - maybe at a shop. I’m not sure after that really, but I’m just trying to take it one step at a time.”

“No lists of all your future careers then?” he asked.

“No, I’ll save the list making for you,” Nicole laughed and then suddenly leaned over and gave him a hug. Draco startled, and then leaned into it, truly happy for his new friend.

A few days later, with Nicole gone, Draco found himself feeling every more aimless than before. He didn’t have the energy or interest in trying to make any new temporary friends. He was ready to get out of there himself. He continued reading through the Mind Health bookshelf during his spare time, moving on to more specific books. While working his way through a book on potion addiction recovery, he came to a section on making amends. It hit hard.

The past few weeks, he had been dealing with unpacking all his long standing issues in therapy (his father was a topic for more sessions than not) and working on coping mechanisms around his anxiety and depression. He was primarily dealing with his guilt by just not thinking about it. It occasionally came up in his one-on-one therapy sessions, but to alleviate some of his more uncomfortable feelings, he was getting quite good at pushing deep down any thoughts of his behavior over the past few years. He knew from his endless reading that wasn’t healthy, and more likely than not was going to come back to bite him.

He made a decision, and went to get some parchment and a self-inking quill.

***

“Another letter?” The orderly, who Draco eventually learned was named Tim, asked as Draco handed him more outgoing mail. This was the fifth letter in as many days.

“I have a lot of apologizing to do,” Draco said simply before walking away.

With the blessing of Healer Smyth on his plan to start writing apology letters, he started with letters to Dean Thomas and Luna Lovegood. He apologized to both of them for his role and inaction regarding their imprisonment in his home. He then wrote to Rosmerta for his beyond unforgivable actions towards her in sixth year. Finally, he wrote to both Katie Bell and Ron Weasley for nearly killing both of them in his pathetic, but dangerous attempts to murder the headmaster. While he started his apology to Weasley for the poisoned wine, he found himself apologizing for six years worth of bullying as well. While he thought he would have terrible anxiety around writing the letters, he found himself calmed by them. He didn’t really expect forgiveness or a reply, but owning up to it - something he’d never been particularly good at doing, always preferring to make excuses and blame others - was a relief.

He felt tired and old. Older than he probably should have felt at eighteen years old, at any rate.

He realized while writing his apologies that he was fully and truly sick of his own bullshit. The constant fear of the past two years, the unspeakably horrible things he had been witness to and occasionally been forced to participate in, the war and death, his two weeks stay in Azkaban - all of it just piled up. And he realized he needed to make some pretty major choices about the kind of life he wanted to live. He still did not know what that might look like, but he knew for damn sure he wanted it to look nothing like the past two years.

So, after he finished his initial apologies, he made a non-insubstantial list of people he needed to apologize to. Healer Smyth clearly had rubbed off on him, Draco thought with amusement.

Now that he’d moved past the big ones - those he’d injured or nearly killed, he was listing those he’d bullied throughout his time at Hogwarts. The list was getting a bit overwhelming, so he decided to start with those he’d bullied the most. Hermione Granger was the top of that list, with Longbottom at a close second. There was a niggling reminder in his brain that he also needed to apologize to Potter, for well… a lot, but he pushed that back to deal with for another day. Their history was too complicated for Draco to know where to start, and the multitude of personal debts in which Draco felt he now owed him just complicated matters.

He sat down with a sigh in the library and started another letter.

***

After an afternoon in therapy, and Draco dodging whether he’d read the Muggle fiction yet (he was still feeling too confused from the whole ordeal), discussing his apology letters, who he’d written to, and how he was feeling about them, they landed back on his future.

“How is the list of potential careers coming along?” Healer Smyth asked.

Draco sighed and pulled out a stack of lists from his hoodie pocket, shuffling through them until he found the right one. He briefly wondered if he was starting to become even more unhinged during his stay here - carrying around a novella’s worth of lists in a Muggle hoodie pocket.

Draco went to hand the healer his list. “Why don’t we go through it together?” Healer Smyth replied waving away the list.

“Okay. Well… and we’re just ignoring the fact that no one is going to hire me right?” Draco raised an eyebrow at his healer.

“Correct,” Healer Smyth said with a friendly glint in his eye.

Draco rolled his eyes, “Fine. Potioneer, I’ve always enjoyed potions, so I suppose I could work for the Ministry, in this fantasy land where they would hire me, or I could work at an apothecary as one of their potioneers. General ministry worker - I’m not sure what I mean by this, only that I’m sure there are plenty of general positions where people are needed to do paperwork and the like. I don’t mind the idea of a boring desk job,” Draco didn’t add that after the past two years, a boring desk job sounded kind of nice.

“I could work in finance, perhaps at Gringotts. And, actually, they might not care so much about my past since most Goblins aren’t really interested in Wizarding problems. I was taught how to deal with finances from a young age, so I could work in investments or something like that.

“And, then… well this is silly, but I just thought, since we’re suspending reality and all for the sake of this activity… maybe mind healing. It’s only that I have been reading the books in the library in the mind healing bookcase, well at this point I think I’ve read all the books in that bookcase, and it’s really interesting. And, maybe not being an actual mind healer, but even a mind-nurse, or just something related to the field,” Draco said in a rush, keeping his eyes a bit off to the side, not wanting to see Healer Smyth’s reaction to this last idea, since it was clearly ridiculous.

“You’ve read all the books in the Mind Healing bookcase?” Healer Smyth looked genuinely surprised. “Including the Muggle Psychology books?”

“Well, yes. It’s really fascinating actually. I know some of the mental health conditions differ for Wizards and Muggles in the way that other diseases do, but it seems like there’s some overlap with the big ones like depression and anxiety and problems from trauma - Muggles call it PTSD. It even seems like there are some gaps with the wizarding books on these issues - I had no idea Muggles ran these large studies - could you imagine how much more Wizards could learn if we had the numbers of people to run studies like that?” Draco was speeding up as he talked, excited to be talking about this with someone finally.

“And for the issues that are similar, what if Wizards could use the Muggle studies as a starting place for potion testing? Obviously we couldn’t test potions on Muggles, but we could use their studies of non-potion and non-medicated therapy as a starting place. I know these are probably only a few books on it, but it really doesn’t seem like anyone has done that before.”

He finally stopped and looked at Healer Smyth who had a genuine smile on his face and eyebrows raised. “Mr. Malfoy, I dare say you’ve found a career path.” Now it was Draco’s turn to be surprised.


	3. Chapter 3

Draco’s hands were sweaty around the cart handles, trying to will himself to move towards the barrier to Platform 9 ¾.

Fully aware of the irony, he felt safe on the far end of the station surrounded by Muggles. He was completely anonymous; he could be anyone. No one cared who he was or knew what he had done. He wondered if he could just go live among them, anonymous for the rest of his days. Surely he could work in a shop. How hard would that be? He could learn how Muggle money worked and read more Muggle books until he could get by as a bookstore clerk.

He stumbled a bit as he was jostled by a harried Muggle, most likely on his way to work. Draco pulled out of his daydreams with a sigh. He could do this. He took a deep breath and started towards the barrier.

After learning more about the requirements for a mind healing career, Draco realized it was in his best interest to return to Hogwarts. He would need quite a few NEWTs to be considered for a healer program with a focus on mind health. Fortunately, he had continued with most of his classes for NEWT-levels at the demand of his father. With his past, Draco was well aware he’d need them to all be outstanding to be considered. It was only his new-found passion for this field, excitement at having a life of his choosing, instead of his father’s, and a tenuous hope that he could get admitted to a program somewhere in the world that allowed him to push through his anxiety of returning.

He had been discharged four weeks after his initial admittance into the Alphred Mentis Ward for Mind Health. This left him two weeks of summer in outpatient care to prepare for going back to Hogwarts. He spent time gardening with his mother and trying to build a better relationship with her, which was easier with his father absent. They still rarely talked about pesky things like feelings, but he enjoyed her company and found working in the dirt soothing. Gardening also helped him keep the anxiety around returning to Hogwarts somewhat at bay. Weeding he found soothing in its repetition, in particular. By the end of August, a garden had never been so weed-free as the small garden off the sitting room at Malfoy Manor.

As he cleared the other side of the barrier, his heart was thumping. He tried to quickly work his way towards the train with his head down, but as he got closer he heard the excitable clusters of families and friends quiet as he passed by, whispers surrounding him like wind. He chanced looking around. He didn’t recognize anyone, it was mostly younger students and their families. It made sense; there would be few students his own age this year. Not everyone decided to come back.

Most of his friends were gone. Pansy had gone off to France as soon as the war was over, unwilling to deal with the fallout of her panicked actions in the Great Hall that night. Vince was dead. Draco felt his chest constrict. He hadn’t heard what Greg was doing. In fact, Draco hadn’t heard from anyone directly, but his mother still kept up correspondence with a few of her friends, and from what he could gather, only Blaise and Millie would be returning from Slytherin to complete their interrupted seventh year. He’d never been particularly close with either of them, and given they had both been neutral during the war, he doubted they would be interested in building a friendship with him now.

He made his way to the train, levitating his trunk behind him, leaving the whispers and stares. He tried to hold on to everything he’d learned and worked on over the summer. He was not the sum of his mistakes. He could do better, be better, be whoever he wanted to be in life. It was his decision and in his control.

He found an empty compartment and sat down, exhausted from that short walk through the platform.

A few students started to enter the compartment and quickly changed their minds when they saw Draco sitting by the window. It was fine, he thought, alone he could do. At least then he didn’t have to see the hatred and disgust on their faces. He would keep his head down and get through this year.

Maybe after it was all done and his probation was over, he’d just leave the country. Find a new place to settle down where his last name didn’t mean anything. He would get his NEWTS so that he could move on and build a life elsewhere. Eventually, when his mother’s probation was over, maybe she could join him. He, at least, would find a job where he could make enough money to send her some every month, ensure she was alright and could survive. He was comforted by having a plan, something to focus on so that he didn’t drown in his anxiety at returning to Hogwarts.

***

“I am so pleased to see all of you back, and to welcome our new students. As I’m sure you have noticed, the staff and volunteers worked hard all summer to repair the castle so that we could resume classes and welcome everyone back for the school year.

“I am, as many of you, looking forward to rebuilding our community that has been torn apart by war these past few years. The staff and I understand, though, that many of you are still recovering from loss, and may still have resentment from things you had been forced to endure. But, our community will not be repaired through continued fighting; we will not replace one war with another. To that end, we are implementing a new policy. Previously, we were a bit lax on fighting and hexing in the halls in between classes, and that only led to Hogwarts being unsafe for some students.

“This year, there will be a no tolerance policy towards fighting. We must find ways to get along and resolve our differences if we are to heal. The first occurrence will result in detention, the second, suspension, and if you are caught fighting a third time, it will mean expulsion. No exceptions.” The headmistress looked over her glasses at the school for a moment to let the new rules sink in, he felt her eyes linger over him for a beat. Draco looked down at his empty plate, breaking the eye contact. He had no problems with those rules; he planned on keeping his head down for once and staying away from everyone.

“Now that we have settled our more serious business, I would like to introduce our new Defense instructor, Simone Bissett, who is joining us from Beauxbatons.” A middle aged brunette witch stood up briefly and nodded to the students in greeting as the students applauded politely.

“Additionally, Rubeus Hagrid will be rejoining the staff for Care of Magical Creatures.” Hagrid waved to the students and many more applauded, particularly at the Gryffindor table.

McGonagall continued, “With that, I am sure you are all hungry and disinterested in listening to any more speeches, welcome and enjoy the feast.” She put up her hands with a small smile as the food appeared on the tables.

The feast was all a bit of a blur for Draco. He sat alone at the far end of the Slytherin table and barely paid attention to any of it. But old habits die hard, and he couldn’t resist looking over at the Gryffindor table during the feast.

Potter sat with Weasley and Granger like always. He looked awful, too thin, with dark circles under his eyes. He looked like he wasn’t participating in whatever conversation was going on that had Finnegan laughing at something Weasley said. He just glanced up at his friends every so often, and when Granger put her hand on his arm, he gave her a small smile, nodding, and went back to staring at his plate.

Draco glanced around the rest of the room. While there was still the first day energy, and excitement of the newly sorted first-years, he noticed that the older students at every table looked more somber than usual, occasionally glancing around the Great Hall as if to see something that wasn’t there. McGonagall had not exaggerated, the school really was repaired, but it seemed the echoes of the war and the final battle were still in the air for many of the students who had witnessed it. Draco felt his chest constrict and worked on his breathing exercises.

As the feast was coming to a close, Draco was relieved to be heading down to the familiar dungeons soon. He was looking forward to pulling his curtains tight around his bed and having some privacy, some space away from the staring that he could see out of the corner of his eye the whole evening. He wasn’t sure if he would just be with Blaise, the only other returning male Slytherin in his year, or if they’d be stuffed in with the current seventh years.

He knew he wouldn’t have any friends this year in the dungeons, but he expected they would ignore him this year.

With no family name or money now, he was too unimportant to be given any attention by his fellow Slytherins. There would be nothing to be gained but only lost as they would tarnish their names by association. Those that remained neutral wouldn’t want their precarious situations destabilized by associated. And, those that came from families that sympathized with the Dark Lord now saw the Malfoy family (at least his mother and him) as traitors due to the testimony of the Chosen One at their trials.

Regardless of their political sympathies, Draco also expected that many a Slytherin would revel at his fall, and most likely participate in ensuring it continued. He’d held court for too long in those dungeons, with quiet threats using his name and status to keep other Slytherins in line and doing his bidding.

Slytherins were very good at freezing people out. Draco had no doubts that would be his fate this year, as he’d been the orchestrator of similar shunnings on more than a few occasions. Being excluded from society was often far more damaging in pure-blooded circles than any form of a direct assault. Without connections, without information to trade and deals to make, even the most wealthy pure-blooded Wizard or Witch would find their power limited. Therefore, the pure-blood children sorted into Slytherin first mimicked and then perfected this form of social control during their time at Hogwarts. A few years ago, he would have been horrified at being the target of their ostracization, but now, it seemed like a much better sentence than the alternative. His family couldn’t really fall any further, so it all felt like an idle threat this year. His housemates rarely resorted to violence with one of their own; the damage of a ruined reputation was much longer lasting than a quickly placed hex.

“Prefects, please take your students to your dorms. And, those of you repeating your seventh year, please wait here, there will be some changes for your with your living arrangements this year,” McGonagall announced as the feast came to an end. Wait, what? The scraping of the long benches could be heard and many shuffling feet, as the younger students all headed off to their dorms. Draco tried not to panic at the unexpected change, digging his fingernails into his palms, trying to ground himself.

As the last of the students left the hall, McGonagall motioned for the remaining students to move to the front of the Hufflepuff table. Everyone looked sceptical as they settled at the table.

“I am so glad to see you have all returned to complete your studies. I know this has been a difficult few years, the last one in particular, and I expect for many of you, it was a hard summer, as there was much loss to grieve. But, I hope we can start working on moving past the war this year at Hogwarts. Since this is a unique situation we find ourselves in, and the dorms are not equipped to handle an eighth year class, we have created a new space for you to call home this year.”

Most of the students looked dejected and a few looked like they were about to interject. Draco immediately felt anxiety wash over him at the news.

McGonagall quickly continued, cutting off any attempt to argue, “You will still have shared dorm rooms, but with fewer students per room, and a new common room. Additionally, since you are all adults, the curfew has been extended by one hour, and you will be allowed to visit Hogsmeade during all weekends, if you so desire.”

She paused for a moment, “I expect you, as adults and the oldest students in the school, to set an example. Now is the time to recover and forgive. There will be no retaliation and no fighting this year. We need to heal and let go of the animosity that led to the war. Understood?”

Everyone nodded, and there were mutterings to the affirmative.

“Very well. Follow me,” she said brusquely as she headed towards the doors to the hall. She led them to a non-descript door on the 3rd floor.

“Consano,” the headmistress said loudly at the door, to ensure all had heard the new password. Draco recognized it as Latin for healing; it seemed that was to be the theme this year.

The new eighth year students quickly and quietly filled in and found their new dorms. Draco was sharing with Longbottom and a Ravenclaw, Anthony Goldstein. He supposed that this was as good as could be expected. Longbottom hadn’t glared at him, or really spared him more than a glance, so he was somewhat relieved to be sharing a room with him, instead of someone like Finnegan who looked like he would sooner murder Draco in his sleep than spend time near him.

Draco opened his trunk at the end of his bed, gathering his nightclothes and journal and a self-inking quill. He tucked the journal and quill quickly under his pillow and changed without looking at his new roommates. Making sure his roommates weren’t paying attention he went back to his trunk and covertly grabbed his hoodie and tucked it under his pillow, as well.

With a large sigh of relief he climbed into his bed, pulled his curtains shut and cast a silencing spell at his curtains, giving him both privacy and solitude. He pulled on his faded hoodie and quickly got under the covers, feeling the strain of the day melt away. Flipping over, he propped himself up on his elbows and took his journal and quill out from their hiding spot. He was determined to not backslide now that he was at Hogwarts. Given the stress of his first day, and all the emotions that had been whirling through him for the past few hours, he knew it was going to be more important than ever to keep up on his mind healing homework.

He opened his journal to the last page, recalling all the things he’d written the night before about his anxieties for today. He hadn’t been cursed or spit on, as he had feared, and with that in mind, he started writing down his three gratitudes for the day. He started with the lack of curses and spitting. His roommates were okay, or at least he didn’t feel threatened by them. It definitely could have been worse. So, he wrote that down for number two. Finally, he was grateful he was allowed back. And, if he made it through the year, he just might have a chance at a future. It wasn’t one of the strongest gratitude lists he’d been able to come up with. He sighed, closed his eyes and hoped for sleep.

***

“... and the Banking Act of 1753 ensured that gallons were required to have 87% gold as a minimum, thus ensuring that the coin was strong enough to be carried, but did not lose its initial value…” Draco felt his eyes drooping as he listened to Binns drone on. They were only three weeks into the semester, but History of Magic was decidedly not getting any more interesting than previous years. He suddenly saw a movement next to him as Lavender Brown slipped into what had been an empty seat at the back of the classroom. He chanced looking over at her, she looked off, her hair was a bit of a mess and… what was that smell? Was she drunk?

She caught him looking over at her, “What the fuck are you looking at, Malfoy?”

He looked away and tried to focus on the lecture.

“Fucking Death Eater,” she hissed under her breath at him.

Everything he felt about himself over the summer, every terrible thing his brain had whispered to him about being terrible and worthless and a waste of space came crashing over him and his chest felt tight. He took a deep breath and focused on breathing. He would not have a panic attack in the middle of History of Magic. He would not.

When he finally calmed down, he looked over at her again out of the corner of his eye to see if she was still staring at him. She wasn’t; she was leaning back in her chair with her eyes closed. She looked terrible.

In fact, he’d noticed most of the eighth years were a bit of a mess. He spent as little time as possible around his peers outside of class, but it was impossible to not notice that several of them, Zacharias Smith and a couple male Hufflepuffs who Draco couldn’t remember their names were regularly drunk in the common room every evening. They didn’t seem to be partying so much as just drinking for the sake of getting drunk. He hadn’t noticed Lavender in that group, so he wondered if she had been just drinking alone. Dean Thomas would leave the room every time Draco entered it, and he barely spoke to anyone beyond Finnegan, at least while Draco was around. Having been at least complicit in Thomas’s imprisonment, he could understand his position.

Hannah Abbott and Susan Bones both often looked red-eyed, as if they’d been recently crying. Millie was often found with them in, tucked into a corner of the library or their common room. All three of them had lost family members during the previous year.

Michael Corner, who Draco had barely noticed in previous years, was suddenly losing his temper regularly. He noticed other Ravenclaws gave Corner a wide berth, as if concerned about setting him off at any moment. In Defense Against the Dark Arts, Draco had noticed that the other Ravenclaws often tried to avoid partnering up with him. Fortunately, he hadn’t picked any fights directly with Draco (mostly because Draco gave him an extra wide berth), but he glared at him quite frequently.

Potter probably looked the worst of them all; he looked like he hadn’t slept in months and was barely eating or speaking to anyone. Draco thought when he saw him during the trials that he must have looked like crap from being on the run for so long and probably not eating regular meals, but now he wasn’t so sure. Granger and Weasley had started off the term hovering around Potter, but it had seemed to just make him more angry and withdrawn. As the weeks went on, Draco noticed they weren’t together as often anymore, and Potter was usually nowhere to be found.

Others from his class seemed to be doing slightly better. Longbottom had thrown himself into Herbology, always partially covered in dirt, with the occasional leaf in his collar or hair; he also seemed to walk around the school with new confidence. Draco supposed killing a giant snake would make you feel slightly more capable at life.

Granger was still burying herself in books and lecturing everyone else about how they needed to start studying now for their NEWTs lest they all fall unrecoverably behind. He had noticed though, that mixed in with her many school books there were multiple self help books on trauma and Muggle books on PTSD. Having exhausted the library at St. Mungo’s and having no idea how to procure Muggle books beyond that, he was irritatingly curious, but didn’t feel brave enough to approach her about it.

Weasley was doing surprisingly well, given the circumstances. Draco had heard one of the twins had died during the battle and felt his gut wrench at the thought. While he may have hated all Gryffindors on principle during his early years and all Weasleys, in particular, he respected the general mayhem the twins caused at school. It was always exciting and gave everyone something to talk about for a day or two. So, he was especially surprised that Weasley seemed to be taking on the role of mother hen in the eighth-year dormitory. He had never responded to Draco’s apology letter, which was to be expected.

The only person who had replied during the summer had been Luna Lovegood with a perplexing letter that had flowers drawn all over the margins and a note that there was nothing to apologize for since he had also been a prisoner.

Draco had been unsure of what to expect from his classmates and the Gryffindors, in general, this year, but Ron didn’t pick fights with Draco or even insult him. He simply ignored his existence, which Draco felt was more than fair and a relief. He definitely didn’t have the energy to fight with the Golden Trio this year. He was pretty sure that whatever tenuous cease-fire that seemed to exist with most of the student population would evaporate instantaneously if he so much as glanced at those three wrong. But, it didn’t seem to be an issue as Potter was generally MIA, Granger was buried in her books and Weasley was busy caretaking for their class in his own way. He was regularly bringing extra food from the kitchens to the eighth year common room, and seemed to be trying to take care of everyone (except Draco, of course) through over-feeding.

As the weeks went by, it seemed that most of the eighth year students were getting worse, not better.

Draco was feeling just not a little bit unsettled by the fact that he seemed to be in better mental and emotional health than the majority of his classmates. Since he’d spent half his summer in St. Mungo’s after a suicide attempt, he thought that was really not a good sign as to how his peers were doing. But then he realized that it was perhaps because he’d spent half his summer in a Mind Healing Ward that he was at least coping and functioning.

The other students didn’t seem to have significantly good coping mechanisms as a group, which Draco supposed was to be expected with a group of 18 year olds who just survived a war. He was surprised that the staff both didn’t seem to notice and didn’t have anything in place to help those who were grieving or struggling. He hoped that someone would notice soon before his entire class self destructed.

***

“In real-life situations, rarely will you find yourself in a dual with just one other individual. Furthermore, when faced with two or even three opponents, you will not find that they will take kindly take turns attacking you,” Professor Bissett explained with a smile. “You will need to learn how to hold your shield spells and cast defensively against multiple hexes and curses that may be hitting simultaneously or in short succession.”

Draco sat hunched over his class notes at the back corner of the room. NEWT-level Defense had more students than many of the other NEWT-levels that year, probably due to the more than average amount of students feeling like this subject was a matter of life and death over the past few years. Due to the high enrollment, the seventh and eighth year students were in classes together, as they were for all their NEWT level courses, but they were still split amongst their original houses, with Slytherin and Ravenclaw both attending this class together.

Both the Slytherins and Ravenclaws seemed to agree that the best way to handle Draco Malfoy being back at Hogwarts was to completely ignore his existence. Where he occasionally got glares and underhanded comments from the other houses, his own completely froze him out as he had suspected they might. He didn’t mind so much at meals, or in their non-practical classes, but group work was becoming a nightmare, and he had a sneaking suspicion today was heading in that direction.

As if on command, Professor Bissett continued, “I’d like you all to get into groups of three or four, with one person acting as the defender at a time. Remember, only minor hexes while we practice, we don’t need to interrupt class with trips to the hospital wing.”

Everyone started levitating their desks to the sides of the room and forming clusters. Draco scanned the room looking for an opening. In some of his other classes, he could rely on Hufflepuff guilt to edge his way into a group, but not among Slytherins and Ravenclaws.

He found himself standing clearly alone at the edge of the room as other students were already moving into the lesson.

“Mr. Malfoy, join this group over here,” Professor Bissett said, coming over towards him and gesturing to a group of seventh year Slytherins, who refused to look over at him. He nodded sharply and headed over to the group that he was clearly unwelcome to join.

The witch he knew as Mia, she was a petite blonde and he was pretty sure she’d had a slight crush on him a few years prior. The student to her right was Grant, his father had been acquaintances with Draco’s father, but Grant’s family had the sense to not get too involved in the war, and the third student, a tall and quiet wizard, Draco knew was named Malcolm. Draco didn’t know anything about him or his family.

“Mia, are you going to get us started?” Grant asked. Draco stepped slightly to the side so that he could face Mia if she were to be the first one on the defence. Before he could even raise his wand, Malcolm stepped in front of him, blocking him from Mia.

As they continued through the lesson, the other three students never looked at him once. The only indication that he wasn’t completely invisible to them was the slight movements they made when reforming to ensure he remained outside of their loose circle and unable to participate in the lesson. He couldn’t simply walk away; they were in the middle of class, and leaving the class altogether would definitely get him in trouble that he couldn’t afford. So, he did the only thing that he felt he could and stood there, humiliated.

After Mia finished up, Grant took his turn, mostly blocking the other two students’ attacks and occasionally getting a retaliatory hex through. As they switched positions, Mia took the place of Malcolm in their circle, blocking Draco from the group.

Finally, Malcolm took his turn, using primarily a strong shield charm against his attackers and dodging a bit with his body. Draco continued to try to look like he was participating for the sake of the professor, but was still physically blocked by Mia. When Malcolm was done, the three stepped closer to each other.

“Well done, Malcolm! I thought I had you for a minute there,” Mia said.

“Surely not,” Malcolm laughed, they turned from Draco and headed towards the edge of the classroom where the groups of three were waiting, having already finished up. The two other groups of four were on their last round.

Draco felt his face flush slightly, wishing he could actually just disappear. It would certainly be less mortifying than having an entire school collectively agree to pretend he invisible, that he was so beneath them that he wasn’t worth their breath to speak to, even to insult.

Every part of him that was raised as a Malfoy wanted to scream, throw a tantrum, do anything to get their attention, but he knew that was a terrible idea. Draco knew that even if their behavior was somewhat childish, what he had done was not; his actions during the war had been serious. He’d almost killed more than one person, he’d been complicit in at least one death, and he had no business arguing with anyone about how they treated him. Secretly, he was afraid that if he pushed it, they’d all tell him what they really thought of him and his still fragile psyche couldn’t risk having his own punishing thoughts mirrored back to him.

He walked to the side of the room to wait with the others. If Professor Bissett noticed he hadn’t cast a single spell all hour, she didn't say anything.

***

Draco awoke from yet another nightmare, panting. He had been running through the Manor’s hallways away from some unknown, undefined assailant. He had felt aware that whatever or whoever was chasing him had been gaining on him, but he’d felt like he was running through molasses, unable to move fast enough to save himself. He tried to shake the dread from his chest.

As he opened his curtains quietly, Draco heard only soft snoring from his roommates. His silencing charms on the curtains seemed to have held up. He peeled off his hoodie, drenched in sweat from the dream, and grabbed his wand. He wasn’t sure he would ever again feel comfortable being without it for even a moment after living in a house of Death Eaters.

He quietly padded towards the bathrooms. He was shaky and wanted to splash water on his face, try to get his bearings.

As he entered the bathroom, he felt that something was off. He heard a sniff, or heavy breathing; he wasn’t sure. He tightened his grasp on his wand, holding it out in front of him as he quietly moved around the wall dividing the shower area from the toilets.

Draco turned the corner and saw someone sitting on the floor, curled up and holding their wand. Potter. What the fuck was he doing?

Before Draco could even register what was happening, Potter pointed his wand at Draco’s chest. “Get out of here, Malfoy!”

Draco froze and tried to take in the scene. Potter had tear tracks down his face, as if he’d been crying, and his left sleeve was pulled up with what appeared to be blood dripping from several points. Draco started to panic, thinking of his attempt in his bathtub and wondering if Potter was trying to kill himself.

But, as he looked closer, he saw that there appeared to be several cuts, none very deep. He was cutting himself. He heard of others that did that during his group therapy sessions - used the pain to feel in control or to feel anything at all. He was still trying to process what this all meant when Potter loudly huffed.

“What the fuck are you still doing here? Enjoying what you’re seeing? Get out!” Harry said venomously.

Draco stood there, alarmed. He couldn’t leave him here like this; should he wake someone? Would Harry leave and take off to where ever the fuck he’d been hiding all term if he left? Would anyone even believe him? So, Draco did the least logical thing and sat down, cross-legged right in front of him.

Whatever Potter had been expecting to happen, that wasn’t it. He froze. “What are you doing?”

“I don’t know,” answered Draco honestly. They stared at each other for a long minute.

“Just… you need to go,” Potter said quietly, lowering his wand.

“I can’t,” Draco said simply. Potter didn’t reply, but seemed to have several emotions warring on his face for the next few minutes. Eventually, his face crumpled and he began to cry.

Draco panicked, not knowing what to do next. Staying had made sense, he couldn’t let Potter continue to mutilate his arm. Draco had fully expected Potter to continue arguing with him, not cry; he wasn’t prepared for this. As Potter sat there hunched in on himself shaking as he cried, something in Draco broke. He looked so sad. Draco leaned over a bit and stiffly and uneasily put his arm around Potter’s shoulder and slowly started to rub his back, an attempt at comfort.

Potter tensed up for a quick moment, but then relaxed against Draco, leaning forward over their awkwardly squished legs. Draco wrapped his other arm around him and held him in an uncomfortable hug for what felt like hours as Potter quietly wept.

Finally, when he’d exhausted his tears, Potter coughed lightly and leaned back. He wiped his nose on the back of his sleeve. Draco tried to ignore the spot on the shoulder of his own pajamas now also covered in tears and snot, figuring that wiping the mess away was probably bad form in that exact moment. Potter rubbed his face with both his hands, clearing away the remnants of tears and cleared his throat.

“Sorry,” he said quietly.

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” Draco replied honestly.

“Right… well, I’m sure you didn’t want to spend your night dealing with me and my fucked-up-ness instead of sleeping,” Potter said sheepishly.

“You aren’t the only fucked up one here.”

Potter huffed a laugh, “I don’t see anyone else crying into the arms of their ex-nemesis in the bathroom in the middle of the night.”

“Maybe not.” Draco laughed gently. They sat quietly for a few minutes.

“I spent most of my summer at St. Mungo’s... in the Mind Health ward,” Draco finally said. He felt like he needed Potter to know he wasn’t alone. He wasn’t the only one with emotional scars from the war.

“What?” Potter looked up surprised.

“I… I tried to kill myself at the beginning of the summer.” Draco hadn’t talked about this outside of therapy with Healer Smyth at all.

“Oh… wow. I didn’t know”

“No one does. I mean, except my mother and mind healer... And, everyone I had to sit through group therapy with for four weeks,” Draco let out a small smile.

“Oh. And are you- are you better now?”

“Sometimes. I don’t want to die anymore if that’s what you mean, but I still have days that aren’t great. It’s hard being here, if I’m being honest.”

“I get that, actually.” Potter said quietly. They sat for a few more minutes in silence, both lost in their own thoughts.

“May I?” Draco tilted his head towards Potter’s still bleeding arm.

Potter shrugged, but looked uneasy.

Draco carefully put one hand under Harry’s arm, turning it slightly to more easily see the inside of his forearm, and then he quietly cast the healing spells with his wand. When the wounds were fully closed up, Draco used a gentle cleaning spell on his arm to clean up the remaining blood. Once Potter’s arm was fully clean, Draco could see the remnants of other cuts, some still healing and scabbed over, others having turned into fine white lines, scars scattered along the inside of his arm. Most of them were small enough to not be noticed easily. But at this distance, Draco could see them clearly. Potter must have been doing this for some time, Draco realized.

He traced his fingers over a few of the scars. Harry quietly cleared his throat and pulled his arm away, wrapping both arms around his knees, hugging them tight. He let out a deep breath that it sounded like he’d been holding for awhile.

“Thanks for staying,” Harry said quietly, chin resting on his knees.

“Of course.” Draco paused. “I know it’s not my business, not really, but you need help.”

“I don’t want to go to the hospital,” Harry said quickly, looking up.

“I don’t blame you,” Draco huffed a laugh. “I probably needed it. It was the right thing for me, but it wasn’t exactly how I would have chosen to spend my summer. I think most people probably work on their issues outside of the hospital. You could still get help, without going to the hospital. I don’t think it needs to be all or nothing.” Draco said carefully, second guessing whether he actually knew enough about any of this to be giving advice in the first place.

“My instinct is to tell you to fuck off again,” Harry looked back up with a small smile, softening the words. “But I’ve known I needed help for awhile. This… this isn’t healthy, obviously. And, I really can’t stand feeling like this anymore. I feel like I’m drowning.” They settled into silence again.

Draco understood the feeling well. Even now, he barely felt like he was keeping his head above water most days. His thoughts drifted to how much worse he’d felt over the summer, especially at the beginning of the summer at the Manor, how he’d went from anger to sadness to an all-pervasive numbness that he thought would never go away. He let his thoughts wander to his therapy, his mother, her garden, and even his father.

Some time later, Harry quietly cleared his throat, breaking Draco out of his memories.

“I once saw a television show where the main character was talking about hitting rock bottom. I didn’t really know what that meant at the time, but… I think maybe this is it,” Harry let out a somewhat unhinged huff of a laugh. “Sitting on the bathroom floor confiding my feelings to someone who tormented me for six years of my life, hoping that maybe he can help me.”

Harry buried his head in his hands, his body shaking a bit. Draco thought he might be laughing; he hoped he was laughing, at least, and not crying again. Draco didn’t know what to say. Harry wasn’t wrong- Draco was probably the person Harry wanted help from the absolute least in this world.

“So now what?” Harry asked after a moment, looking up at Draco. He lowered his legs down so they were crossed, knees bumping Draco’s.

Draco huffed, “Fuck if I know,” and gave him a small smile. Harry let out a surprised laugh.

“Well you seem like you know more about this, I mean, Hermione keeps not-so-subtly leaving me self-help books on trauma in my bookbag, under my pillow, on my nightstand, but I don’t know how to do this - I don’t know if I can do this. Everything I think about trying to, I don’t know, ‘deal’ with everything, I just get overwhelmed and start feeling like I can’t get out of bed.” Harry picked at the slightly frayed ends of his pajama bottoms while he talked, keeping his eyes firmly down.

“Yeah, I know the feeling very well. I’ve been reading a lot, you know, outside of therapy, but I don’t have any answers - not really,” Draco said. “It is important, though, to get out of bed. You can’t let it take over or you’ll feel worse. I know it feels like it’s helping just laying in bed and hiding a way, but it’s really the worst thing you can do for yourself if you are depressed. You could start by reading some of Granger’s books, but you should probably also talk to someone, at least when it’s bad. I’m sure Granger or Weasley would be happy to talk to you about all of it and help you work through it.”

“No,” Harry said quickly. “They just… I can’t talk to them. They both mean well, and I know they love me, but somehow it’s so much worse talking to them. Like…. I’m so aware of how sad and pathetic I am when I’m with them. It’s embarrassing. Not that tonight hasn’t been incredibly embarrassing also.” He let out a short laugh. “But, I don’t want them to know how bad of shape I’m in.”

“I hate to break it to you, Potter, but from what you’ve said, I’m pretty sure Granger at least has some idea.” Draco raised an eyebrow at him, which got a small huff of a laugh out of the other man.

“Okay, well. True. But that doesn’t mean I want her to be my therapist,“ he countered.

“That’s fair, but you need to talk to someone. What about girl Weasley? Or Longbottom? He seems like he is doing alright this year, better than most at least.”

Harry sighed, “Ginny and I aren’t.... I don’t want to talk to them.”

“Maybe you could - and this would probably be best anyways - maybe you could talk to McGonagall about seeing a mind healer on the weekends. We can go to Hogsmeade any weekend this year, so you could always apparate or floo to London.”

Harry shrugged and kept picking at the hem of his bottoms.

Draco sat quietly for a moment, unsure of how much to push. “You really should talk to someone though,” he said quietly.

Harry looked up at Draco for a moment and then back down at his frayed hem. “Do you think, I mean, if you don't mind, could I talk to you? Just sometimes when it’s bad?”

Draco looked up, surprised.

“Why?”

Harry flushed a little. “Well you seem to get it. I don’t think my friends really do - they all cope so differently, and they are all doing better. But I think maybe you actually understand a bit. Plus you seem like you really know what you are talking about.”

“But, I mean, I can’t be your therapist. I’m not trained for that no matter how many books I’ve read.”

“It’s fine. I understand.” Harry looked dejected. Draco ached for him; it wasn’t that long ago he’d felt that helpless.

“But, maybe… I could- I can be a friend to talk to.”

Draco stared resolutely at his knees, afraid of the reaction he’d see in Harry’s eyes. He didn’t know why this was so important to him, except, well, it had always been hadn’t it? The friendship he always coveted and never got. Only now, for the first time he was offering it with no strings, no expectations. And, he’d never felt like he needed someone to talk to himself so much as these past few months. There was only so much isolation a person could take.

Plus, he reasoned, if he could help Harry with this it would help him repay back the very large debts he now owed Harry, between the testimony at the trial and saving his life in the Come and Go Room. That was a perfectly reasonable reason for this to matter so much to Draco. Right? Malfoys did not let themselves stay in someone’s debt, Draco thought, as he resolutely tried to ignore the voice in the back of his head reminding him that he really just wanted a friend.

“Okay,” Harry said suddenly.

Draco looked up surprised to see Harry looking at him resolutely, and repeated, “Okay?”

“Yes. You really do seem to understand, and I- well, I really appreciate your help tonight. And you seem to be doing well this year, or at least you aren’t a complete hot mess,” Harry continued.

“Well, I have been working very hard to at least be a functional mess; keep it under wraps and all,” Draco retorted.

“What I mean is you seem calmer. Obviously, you aren’t yelling insults at me anymore,” Harry gave him a smile, “Plus I don’t know, I think it might be easier to talk to you than my friends. It’s not quite the same… Like it doesn’t count.”

Oh. Draco felt his heart drop, stung. Right, he didn’t count. How could he forget? He supposed it made sense, what was he to Harry, really? That didn’t make it hurt any less.

“I mean, I just feel like I’m not letting you down, not like my friends,” Harry continued.

“Right, no, I understand,” Draco forced a smile.

“You, you’re not going to tell anyone, right?” Harry asked quietly.

“No. But-” Draco gathered his thoughts for a minute. Could he even promise this? What if Harry got worse? What if this all spiraled out of control? He couldn’t handle the thought of any more guilt on his already strained and overloaded conscious.

Draco took a breath. “I feel like I need to say that if I think you are getting worse or in danger, I will absolutely feel obligated to tell someone, okay? I made a decision this summer that I don’t want to be complicit in shitty things anymore. And… it won’t help you if you are in real trouble and I keep it quiet, so I won’t do that.”

Harry looked at him closely for a minute and then nodded, “That’s fair.”

“So now what?” Harry smiled as he repeated his earlier question.

“I don’t know. I think for starters, do you think you can stop cutting yourself?” Draco asked. He hoped he was doing the right thing, not going straight to McGonagall.

“I’m not sure,” Harry answered honestly.

“Ok, I understand. How about this, do you think you could stop cutting yourself until the weekend- Friday, that’s two days away?” Draco had seen the nurses and healers use this technique when trying to get people to work on suicidal thoughts and behavior, he thought maybe it would work here too.

Harry took a deep breath, “Okay. I can try to do that…”

“If it gets too hard and you think you can’t make it, come get me, okay? Just to talk, or even just sit with you so you have someone there, okay?”

Harry nodded, “Okay, I can do that.” He started to get up and stopped, “Thanks, Malfoy.” He then nodded and headed out to his dormitory.

Draco had forgotten why he had even come into the bathrooms to begin with, nightmares long since forgotten, and headed back to his own room, overwhelmed with conflicting emotions. He was genuinely worried about Harry, but there was that nagging voice at the back of his head asking him what he hoped to get out of this. Did he really think that he could help Harry? And, then what? Harry would become his friend? That Draco could suddenly become a new person and befriend the Savior? That anyone would ever want to be friends with him?

He climbed in his bed and fell into a fitful sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

“I don’t give a fuck, Boot!” Michael Corner spat out.

“You know, everyone is getting sick of your crap this year,” Terry Boot retorted.

“I don’t recall asking for your opinion!” The two young men stood in the middle of the common room, squaring off.

Draco had no idea what had started this; he’d been studying in a far corner away from the rest of his peers, and had only looked up when what started as a loud conversation escalated to full on yelling. Everyone was watching now though, unsure of whether to step in between the two friends.

“You know what? Fine. I give up! I don’t know what your deal is anymore, and I’m about past caring at this point!” Boot grabbed his books from where he’d been studying and stalked off towards his dorm room.

“What? Anyone else have a fucking problem?” Corner turned on the rest of the room.

No one replied, so he huffed and headed out the main door.

“Well that was fun,” Zacharias Smith said loudly from his small group of seemingly drunk (on a Monday evening, no less) Hufflepuffs, who all laughed.

Draco looked around. Did no one else even notice that his entire cohort was self-destructing? Draco let out a breath. It was like watching a month-long train wreck, and waiting for someone to pull the brakes to slow down the crash, except… no one was pulling the breaks.

He’d never sat on the sidelines like this before. A couple years ago, he would have just gotten involved if only to stir the cauldron - enjoying the entertainment of it all, usually at other people’s expense.

Now that he no longer had any interest in making more people miserable, he didn't know what to do with himself. His instinct was still to get involved, but he knew it would only bring unwanted attention back on himself, which was the last thing he wanted this year. He’d have to learn how not to be the center of attention for once.

Looking back, he found it a bit ironic that while he was certainly cowardly enough to look the part of a good self-preserving Slytherin, in practice, he could never keep his damn mouth shut and often threw himself headlong into things that blew up in his face. From the moment he could talk, he was concocting half-baked plans that somehow always backfired and only managed to get himself in trouble instead.

This year, he would keep his head down, get his NEWTs, and get the fuck out of there. Learn some self-preservation, for once.

He glanced back up to where Boot was in deep conversation with some of the other Ravenclaws, clearly upset, and wondered if he could convince Granger to do something about it. Maybe she could tell McGonagall, or convince the board that mind healers were needed. She was always working on some bleeding-heart cause, right? Surely she would do something about it. He could just push her in that direction and then stay out of it.

He looked over at her to see that she was, yet again, buried in her books, looking somewhat maniacal with her hair frizzing out and a quill haphazardly stuck through a messy bun on the top of her head. She just seemed not bothered by anything but the mound of homework she was working her way through. Well, he’d just stay out of it then, they could fend for themselves.

Draco grit his teeth and went back to his charms essay, trying to focus, agitated as ever.

Finally, after reading the same paragraph three times, he gave up and headed upstairs to his dorm.

“Hey, Malfoy!” he heard someone coming up behind him, and turned around, hand moving towards his wand.

Harry was running up the stairs. Draco stopped to wait.

“I was wondering, what are you doing right now?” Harry asked, catching his breath.

“I was just heading up to my room, I guess. I can’t seem to focus on this charms essay,” Draco replied. “Why?”

“I was just wondering if you wanted to, you know, talk or hang out for a bit,” Harry said, his face flushed, perhaps from the run up the stairs.

“Oh, sure. Of course.” Draco was surprised. Deep down, he didn’t really expect Harry to ever take him up on the offer. Draco quietly checked in with him on Friday, as promised, to see how he was doing; Harry had insisted he hadn’t cut himself since and thought he would be okay for a few more days, at least.

“Do you want to go for a walk?” Draco asked.

“Yeah, that sounds great,” Harry smiled, looking relieved. They headed back down the stairs. Draco tried to ignore the prickly feeling from feeling eyes on him as they walked through the common room together towards the door.

They made their way towards the main floor and exterior doors in silence; Draco was feeling awkward now, he wondered if he should make small talk while they walked through the castle to the front doors. His mind started spinning with anxiety, should he say something? Maybe they could talk about Quidditch… but no, Harry wasn’t on the team anymore and he had overheard him telling Weasley that he didn’t care anymore. The weather? They were indoors; that would be weird.

Just as Draco’s anxiety was getting to epic heights, they made their way out the front door and Harry broke the silence.

“That was pretty crazy with Corner, wasn’t it?”

Draco let out a breath. “Yeah, I don’t know what that was about. I don’t remember him ever having a temper like that before, do you?”

“No, not at all. When he was dating Ginny, he seemed really calm and nice.” They walked through the slightly dewy grass and settled back into silence. The sun was low in the sky and causing the world to look slightly amber.

“How are you doing?” Draco finally asked.

Harry ran his hand through his hair. “Oh, er- okay, I guess. I haven’t, you know, since that night… if that’s what you were wondering.”

“No, I mean, yes, that’s good, but I was also just wondering how you were, not that I don’t care about that also...” Draco said, mentally kicking himself for his awkwardness.

He never thought of himself as an inarticulate person, but somehow Harry Potter had always seemed to bring out the worst in him. When he was younger, Potter brought out his temper and inability to control his emotions, and now, lately it seemed he was often stumbling over himself, self-consciously, from just trying to have a simple conversation.

“Oh, well I’m okay actually, thanks,” Harry gave him a small smile.

“That’s good. Okay is good,” Draco smiled back.

They turned and headed towards the lake, walking in silence for a few minutes, each lost in their own thoughts.

“Did you… I mean, do you want to talk? About anything?” Darco asked, unsure of what Harry actually needed from him or how to help.

Harry ran his hand through his hair. “Not really. I just thought we could, I don’t know, just hang out a bit.”

“Oh, sure. That’s fine,” Draco replied, unsure if that meant that Harry just didn’t want to talk about the serious stuff or not talk at all.

As they made it to the lake and started down the worn path around the edge, Draco tried to convince himself that it was probably just as well Harry didn’t want to have any sort of serious talk. For the past few days, Draco had been a bit worried that if Harry did want to talk to him, he wouldn’t know what to say. Or worse, what if he said the wrong thing and made Harry even worse. Really, after being ignored constantly, he wondered if he even remembered how to hold any conversation. He started thinking about the Slytherins again, ruthless in their shut-out. Well, it wasn’t unexpected, really, he thought. His thoughts drifted to his eighth year classmates, all seemingly hurting in their own way, not coping.

“Do you think our class is falling apart?” Draco asked abruptly.

“What?” Harry looked confused.

“Just, have you noticed? Everyone is a mess, and I can’t tell if I’m the only one that has noticed.” Draco wasn’t sure why he was even bringing this up right now, but it had been bothering him… quite a bit.

Harry frowned, thinking. “I guess that’s to be expected, right? After a war?”

“I suppose. Yes. But, it seems like people need help, and I don’t understand why there wasn’t something put in place. I mean, even just talking about the eighth year students, half the Hufflepuffs are drunk all the time - that can’t be healthy - Corner is yelling at everyone and picking fights in the hallway. I saw him about to get into a fight with a 5th year the other day over the boy just accidentally bumping into him.

“Lavender Brown showed up drunk to a class the other day - class! The Hufflepuff girls are crying all the time. The Patil twins are barely talking to anyone, they just keep to themselves in the corner. I’m pretty sure Pavarti has even stopped gossiping, which I realize sounds like a good thing, but it’s not like her. And you know, you’re, you know... “ Draco waved towards Harry’s arm. “And that’s just what I’ve seen. I’m usually in the library, by myself.”

Harry looked surprised. “Honestly, I haven’t even noticed most of that. I saw Zacharias Smith and Justin drunk a couple times, but I thought they were just, you know, letting off some steam.” Harry frowned and looked deep in thought. “I’ve probably just been so wrapped up in my own stuff, I haven’t noticed.”

Draco sighed. “But what about the teachers? Shouldn’t they notice?”

He plopped down on a spot of grass near the lake. Harry sat next to him, arms folded over the top of his knees.

“They’re probably dealing with their own stuff too.” Harry looked thoughtful. At that, Draco realized most of the other students probably really hadn’t noticed. He felt really frustrated, was he meant to do something about this? He thought McGonagall was likely to laugh him out of her office if he went to her with suggestions to help his fellow students. Because, really, weren’t they all in this mess in the first place at least partially because of him?

They sat in silence, both lost in their own thoughts as the sky turned from amber to a dark orange and navy, spots of red reflecting off the ripples in the lake.

***

Over the next few days, Draco resolutely tried to ignore the nagging feeling in the pit of his stomach that might have been something like concern for his fellow classmates. He didn’t even understand why it mattered to him. That wasn’t like him, worrying about others. At least not others that weren’t immediate family, or maybe a friend or two. His inability to stay out of things seemed to be getting channelled in a new and, if he was honest, somewhat uncomfortable direction. He blamed all those damn books he read over the summer; while he liked the idea of doing research or working in the mind health field, he really hadn’t been planning on getting _involved _in helping his classmates. He shook it out of his head and focused on the copious amount of homework that was being assigned.

On Thursday afternoon, he finally headed to the library to finish his charms essay that was now due the following morning and was still barely started. He just needed to concentrate on his work - study, keep his head down, keep out of trouble, get his NEWTs and get out of here. He needed to refocus on what mattered.

As he entered the library, he saw two younger Slytherin girls crying behind one of the stacks and holding each other. This was getting ridiculous, he thought. It felt like a sign. The school clearly needed to help the student population, and somehow none of the staff were doing anything about it.

He saw Granger half hidden behind a large stack of books a few tables down and made a decision. He was going to ask her to help, then they could get some mind healers into the school, and he could stop worrying about his classmates hexing each other or becoming raging alcoholics.

As he got closer to her table, he started to panic. She wasn’t going to want to help him; she didn’t want anything to do with him. At the last minute he veered to the side and picked up a random book off a shelf. He looked out of the corner of his eye towards her; she was still buried in her homework and hadn’t seemed to notice anything weird, or really, him at all. He flipped through a few pages of the book before putting it back and quickly heading towards the back of the library.

He let out a steadying breath; he needed to pull it together. Maybe someone else would be able to help him. He tried running through a list of anyone at the school that might help him with this. He knew how to research for school, but proposing something to the board or the Ministry just felt so out of his depth. In the past, he would have just written home to his father and his father would have simply made it happen. He couldn’t think of a single person that would talk to him besides Potter, let alone help with with his crazy project. No, he needed to do this himself.

***

He could not do this himself.

He had determined some of the issues with funding, and had managed to research how to propose changes to the ministry and to the board. But, he could find absolutely no examples or history for bringing in outside help Mind Healing or otherwise to Hogwarts. Really, other than the small ward he’d spent the better part of his summer in, it seemed Wizarding society didn’t pay attention to mental and emotional health, at least not in any sort of professional capacity. He had never really heard much about it from his parents or classmates, now that he thought about it. Really, the only mentions of it were a bit of a joke- if someone was acting abnormal, saying they’d wind up in the mind health ward. Draco frowned, realizing other than himself and the other patients he met over the summer, he’s not sure he knew of anyone who had ever been to a mind healer. He’d never really had reason to think about it before.

To make matters even more complicated, it seemed from what he was reading that if he needed to go to the board or the Ministry for approval, he would need to show examples, precedence, something to show this had worked before. It seemed that with anything that required funding, no one wanted to be the first to do it in case the project was a failure. But there was no precedence. It became an endless loop of a problem: a program for this didn’t exist, so he needed to propose it to the board, but he couldn’t propose it to the board because the program didn’t exist.

Draco dropped his head on the tabletop, hard. This was impossible.

Want to call yourself High Inquisitor, make tons of changes to the school and disband Quidditch and every other club at the school? Well, as long as it’s free, go right ahead! Want to create a new class and hire an additional teacher? You’d better be able to show that it has been done at another school and was a success.

The more he read about how hard it was to get anyone to agree to any changes that required outside funding, the more depressed Draco started to feel about this whole endeavour. He started to wonder if this was the reason Wizards didn’t have science classes, since they hadn’t been around in the late middle ages when most of the curriculum was originally set.

Draco wasn’t sure if there was any precedence at other Wizarding schools, since they had limited access to information like that in the school library. All other information on other schools was generally kept secret, so there was very little in print. So, he was limited to Hogwarts… and Muggle.

He was acutely aware that the best examples and plans on how to go about this were most likely Muggle. The problem was he didn’t have the first idea on how to go about doing Muggle research. Were there libraries? Were they private libraries like many of the pure-blood families owned, or did they have libraries in all their schools? From what he’d heard from other students, it seemed like there were a lot of Muggle schools. How would he know which school to go to in order to find this information? Or did all the Muggle schools have similar books? Would he even be allowed to go into a Muggle school if he didn’t go there? He imagined a Muggle trying to walk into Hogwarts to use the library (even if they could get past all the Muggle-repelling charms). The idea was laughable, and the reverse, Draco wandering into a Muggle school, just as much so.

With a sigh, he decided to put together what he had, suck it up, and ask Granger for help.

He gathered his books and notes and headed back to the dormitory. It was close to curfew, so no other students were around. But, as he walked towards the end of a long hallway a few minutes later, he had the uneasy feeling that he wasn’t alone.

He always tried to keep an eye out for other students who might be holding a grudge whenever he was traveling alone. So far, the new ‘no fighting’ policy seemed to be working, and the majority of students had satisfied themselves with keeping Draco totally and thoroughly isolated and ostracized. But, still, he walked around feeling like there was a target on his back most days. It was just a matter of time until a hot-tempered Gryffindor, or maybe even Hufflepuff decided that the emotional damage being inflicted wasn’t enough and that they needed some physical, tangible revenge.

He turned the corner and heard definitive footsteps behind him.

Draco whirled around, wand in hand. The hallway was empty.

“Who’s there? At least have the fucking courage to show your face!”

He lifted his wand to cast a spell to knock over any assailants. It wasn’t particularly powerful, but it was a good spell when you weren’t sure where to cast, since it covered a wide area. In a quiet space like the empty hallway, it would at least give him a sense of where they were if they were if they were disillusioned- and maybe buy him a minute to defend himself… or run.

“Whoa! Wait, no!” Harry suddenly appeared in a spot five feet away from him, holding his shimmery invisibility cloak in hand.

“Potter! What the fuck! You scared me half to death.” Draco took a deep breath, trying to calm the adrenaline that had started coursing through his veins.

“Sorry, sorry! I just… I just wanted to see if you wanted to hang out again, or you know, go for a walk,” Harry said, fiddling with his cloak.

“What? Sure, fine. But- why were you following me?”

“Old habits?” Harry asked with a sheepish grin.

“Right, okay, we’ll just pretend that’s a perfectly normal explanation for stalking and move on.” Draco replied dryly.

Harry shrugged, still looking a bit embarrassed.

Draco rolled his eyes, finally feeling like his heart was beating normally again, and continued, “Alright, let’s go for a walk.” Draco tipped his head towards the hallway that would lead them outdoors and turned to head in that direction.

Harry hurried to join Draco and gave him a small smile. Draco returned the smile and let out a final breath dispelling what was left of his earlier anxiety. He was very relieved it hadn’t been a student out for revenge, and now that he was calm enough to think straight, he wasn’t too put out to have some company, either.

Draco had been trying to ignore how lonely he was getting, but the isolation was starting to get to him. In the past, he may not have had many, if any, truly close friends, but he had always had the attention of his housemates. Draco typically drew a crowd when he shared his funny (and nearly always boastful) stories. He’d always easily found someone to sit with at meals or work with in class. And, he had never lacked for an audience when he ranted for long periods of time about certain teachers, or Potter, or classwork, or the stupid rules at Hogwarts, or Potter.

His Slytherin classmates had not spoken a word to him all term, as he had expected. Where he’d first thought of the ostracization as a relief, better than having to look over his shoulder for hexes, at any rate, it was starting to get to him. They continued to pretend he didn’t exist, in classes, during group work, in the halls. Worse still, the other houses seemed to be slowly joining in on the game, particularly the seventh year students who were also in his NEWT-level classes.

On more than one occasion he found himself without a partner in classes, particularly when there was an odd number of students. Some of the teachers, like Professor Bissett forced him to work with a group that didn’t want him, while others just ignored Draco as resolutely as his classmates and let him work alone. Even when paired up with another student, they often seemed to do their level best to ignore him and do the bare minimum of interaction to complete the activity.

At mealtimes, no one sat within a ten foot radius of him. The near constant silent attack, for Draco was finally realizing that was what it was, was taking its toll. He found the thoughts he’d had over the summer creeping back in, that he was worthless, that he was terrible, that he was nothing but a disappointment to everyone that had ever loved him.

He was starting to realize he might need someone to talk to as desperately as Harry. After a summer of being upset that he was constantly being forced to talk in therapy and group and being constantly bombarded with talking and listening, the irony was thick. He was now desperate for anyone to talk to him, even for a minute.

Draco wasn’t sure how to bring anything up though - how to talk about anything that mattered with Harry. Everytime he tried to bring up any sort of serious topic or ask if Harry wanted to talk about the things he was dealing with, Harry got cagey and distant.

They turned a corner and Draco tried to snap himself out of it. It would be no good to chase Harry away with his maudlin thoughts, as Harry was possibly the only student in the entire school that had spoken to him by choice all term.

“How are your classes going?” Draco tried to break the silence and distract himself from his depressing thoughts.

Harry shrugged. “Fine, I guess. How are yours?”

Draco thoughts flashed through the near constant embarrassment of being intentionally and obviously excluded in all his classes, and immediately regretted bringing up this topic. He might want to talk to Harry about stuff that he was dealing with also, but that was just too embarrassing.

“Fine,” Draco finally replied. Harry gave a nod in acknowledgement and they continued in silence as the exited the school.

The sky was full of heavy clouds and a dampness hung in the chilly air. The chill seemed to prevent any of the usual grassy scents of the grounds. Draco cast a warming spell on both of them as they turned, in unspoken agreement, towards the lake again.

As they walked, Harry looked over at Draco a couple times, seemingly making up his mind about something. Draco started to worry that he was going to tell him he didn’t want to hang out anymore. Harry probably realized what a terrible idea this was. He supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised.

Draco felt his stomach start churning at the idea of another embarrassment, another rejection. As the silence stretched on, he wished Harry would just get it over with. Why even bother on this long walk just to tell him he doesn’t want anything to do with him? Harry was probably trying to be noble or something stupidly Gryffindor - make sure other students didn’t hear and try to save Draco the public humiliation. Not like all the other students weren’t secretly laughing at Draco’s demise this year, enjoying how far he’d fallen. He started picking at his cuticle of his thumb nail with this middle finger, a new nervous habit he’d developed that year, getting more anxious waiting for Harry to just say whatever he’d come out here to say.

Harry looked over at him for what was maybe the fifth time.

Draco stopped walking and turned towards him. “Potter- just. Just spit it out already.”

Harry stopped abruptly. “Oh! I was just wondering about something, I- I.. well honestly, I’m not sure I want the answer.” Harry looked off towards the forest, as if avoiding Draco’s gaze.

“Just ask already. I can’t take the suspense any more,” Draco said. Whatever this was, he was sure it wasn’t going to be good; he might as well get it over with. It was always just a matter of time before he lost the only person in the school that talked to him, anyways. He braced himself.

“Why didn’t you write me an apology?” Harry asked, and finally meeting Draco’s eyes.

“What?”

“This summer. You wrote a whole bunch of apologies. As far as I can tell you apologized to everyone… except me.” Harry looked like a kicked puppy. “I mean I don’t _need_ one, it’s not like… I mean- I just didn’t understand…” he trailed off.

“Oh.” Draco’s mind started spinning, this was not what he had expected. He really wasn’t sure how to answer that question, at least not without some humiliating admissions.

“It’s okay. Sorry- I shouldn’t have asked,” Harry turned to start walking again, but Draco grabbed his sleeve.

“No wait. You’re right, I should explain.”

Draco took a deep breath, steeling himself. “It wasn’t… I know I owe you an apology. So don’t think that wasn’t why.” Harry looked at him curiously.

“I was too embarrassed. I tried, I really did. I actually started a letter several times. But, not only was I just completely horrible to you for years, I also was now in your debt. You saved my life, and then you went and did this crazy thing to help me and my mother stay out of prison, which is practically another life debt, and which I still don’t understand why you did. And then, you even gave me back my wand.

“And I was raised that debts need to be repaid, and ideally other people owe you, not the other way around. And then I was just there, last summer, broke and powerless and in absolutely no position to pay back any sort of debt and then on top of that I really owe you a massive apology. So, every time I tried to write it I just got too overwhelmed, so then I just... didn’t,” Draco confessed.

“But, you don’t owe me anything. That’s not why I did any of it! You don’t really think that I would have testified for you for a favor, do you?” Harry’s eyes narrowed.

“No! That’s not what I mean. I know- I know that’s not why you did it. It’s… you don’t understand. You can’t understand- it’s just a part of that culture, my culture. People don’t do things like that for each other, not without expecting something in return. And, I know you don’t expect anything, that you aren’t like that, but _I _still feel like it’s owed.”

“Is this why you offered to help me? In the bathroom?” Harry looked devastated.

“No! I was worried about you. I am worried about you!”

“Last summer after Ron and Hermione both got letters from you, I wondered… but then I thought, you know, maybe it was worse, the stuff you did to them. Well, especially Ron with the, you know… when...” Harry waved his hand as if to dismiss it away, seemingly trying to avoid directly bringing up the time that Draco had almost murdered his best friend. “But then when I heard, from others… when we got back to school. It seemed like you apologized to everyone else. Everyone except me. I thought, maybe, you just hated me so much still… That you couldn’t bring yourself to apologize to me.”

“What?” Draco tried to process all of that. “No. _No_,” he said emphatically. “Harry, that’s not- No. I don’t hate you. I don’t hate you at all. Really, I probably haven’t for some time, but definitely not now. I couldn’t apologize because of my own issues, it had nothing to do with you. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t apologize this summer. And I’m extremely sorry that I was such a prick to you for so many years. You never deserved that.”

“Oh,” Harry said, looking slightly embarrassed. “Ok.” He gave Draco a small smile, and nodded towards the path they were still stopped on. They slowly resumed their interrupted walk. Draco’s mind was still spinning from this unexpected turn of conversation.

“Sorry,” Harry said a moment later.

“For what?” Draco looked over at him, genuinely confused.

“For thinking the worst. Of you,” Harry replied quietly.

Draco huffed a short laugh, “I think it’s pretty reasonable to think the worst of me, Potter.”

“No, it’s not. Well, a year ago, maybe, but not anymore. You’re different, you’ve changed… I can tell. And, it’s real, I mean, it’s not just an act… I wasn’t sure at first,” Harry confessed.

Draco looked over at him for a moment, and felt a twisting in his gut. He didn’t feel like he’d changed- not really, not enough. He looked down at the path in front of him as he quietly and honestly replied, “I’m trying.”

They turned along the barely-there path that curved around the edge of the lake, worn from the many students who walked this route. The damp air eventually forced its way through Draco’s warming charm, causing a deep chill. The whole landscape seemed to be tinged in grey at the moment, as if reflecting his mood.

“So… how are things going for you?” Draco asked. Harry seemed marginally more open to talking about things that mattered today if their last conversation was any indication, and Draco felt a sudden urge to fulfil his promise and help Harry.

“Fine.” Harry kept looking ahead as he walked.

“Is there… I mean- do you want to talk about anything? Or, you know, things that have been bothering you?”

“Not really.”

Draco held back a sigh. “It’s just- when we talked before… in the bathroom… you said you understood you needed to talk about stuff. It’s important to have someone you can talk to.” Draco didn’t add that he also really needed someone to talk to.

“Well I don’t have anything to talk about. Can’t we just… hang out? Does everything have to turn into a therapy session? God, it’s bad enough with Hermione shoving books at me constantly and looking at me like I’m going to break at any moment. And Ron keeps giving me food and acting like I’m not taking care of myself.” Harry stopped walking and turned to Draco. “I’m fine, okay? I don’t need you to take care of me.”

“Harry-” Draco started.

“It’s getting pretty late, we should probably get back.” Harry turned towards the school and started walking at a brisk pace. Draco had to break into a jog to catch up.

Draco felt his stomach lurch. Had he already messed everything up with Harry? He just asked a question right? But, then, that’s what he did. He screwed things up. Always making the wrong choice. It was only a matter of time before he screwed this up- that he pushed away his only maybe-friend, the only thing in his life that made it worth getting out of bed most mornings. He shouldn’t have pushed. His thoughts spun and spun in circles, each getting slightly darker than the last until he found himself facing the common room door. Draco rapidly blinked his slightly burning eyes.

Harry came to a stop with his hand on the doorknob. “Hey, er, I’m just a bit tired. Sorry about before.”

“Sure, it’s fine.” Draco replied quickly. Harry nodded as they walked through and went their separate ways.

  
  
  



	5. Chapter 5

“Now, remember, in order to repot the bush successfully and safely, one student will need to hold the fire freezing charm while the other two repot, carefully and gently arranging the smaller roots in place as the bush is lowered. And, it absolutely must remain on fire during repotting or it will not adjust to the new container. No extinguishing charms, no water, nor any other spells that might extinguish the flames. Any questions?” Professor Sprout asked, as she moved to the front of the room.

“Alright then, get to it.”

Draco wiped his brow that was damp with sweat from the dry heat coming off the immature Fire Seed Bush in front of him. They were more difficult to repot at this age since they were both temperamental and dangerous, if not handled correctly.

He turned to the two Ravenclaws at his table. Luna Lovegood was doodling on her book, while the other seventh year Ravenclaw, Suzanne, had already started preparing the larger pot for the bush. Last time he’d been stuck in a group with Suzanne, she’d kept her back turned to him for the whole hour, and he was only able to glimpse at the work being done over her head.

He sighed, prepared for another terrible class.

“You know, Draco, you should really do something about those Blurvles that have been following you around. They ward off companionship and make people lonely.” Luna suddenly looked up at him with her large blue eyes.

Suzanne snorted loudly at that.

Draco felt his face flush. Apparently, they’d moved on to making fun of him to his face now. Cute, he thought, making up an imaginary infestation to illustrate that everyone in the school was mocking him silently while ignoring his presence. He wondered if he hadn’t given Luna enough credit before; he’d always thought she was a bit daft and naive, but it turned out she was as ruthless as the rest of them. He couldn’t decide if this was better than or worse than being completely ignored.

Ignoring the blatant dig, he got to work, preparing the special mix of soil they would need for repotting.

“If you can find a way to get rid of them, you’ll be happier. I can give you a copy of a Quibbler article about them. It had all sorts of useful information,” Luna continued while putting on her dragonhide gloves.

Suzanne was quietly shaking with laughter at this point. Draco grit his teeth. It’s not like he could defend himself to Luna, of all people. What was he going to say? Hey, I know I helped hold you hostage in a dungeon all year, but could you please be nice to me?

“Who wants to hold the charm?” he finally asked.

“I’ve got it,” Suzanne said brusquely, elbowing him out of the way to stand center to the bush that was dancing in flames.

“Fine,” Draco said, anger warring with complete embarrassment. Every time he thought the humiliation couldn’t get worse, somehow it did.

***

Trying to spell off the grime and soil from Herbology from his robes as he went, Draco stomped back to his dorm. At this point, he was just in survival mode—trying to just take it one day at a time until he could take his NEWTs and be done with the place.

He thought about dropping his Mind Healing project all together. Really, why should he try to help anyone?

They could all rot in the seventh level of hell for all he cared, the whole lot of them. Let them be miserable and drinking to excess and crying and fighting with each other and hurting themselves- damn.

The memory of Harry crying in the bathroom sprang to mind. Draco felt his anger deflate. Harry still needed help—Harry who had talked to him, and confided in him and spent time with him, who didn’t treat him like he was invisible or a waste of space. Harry, whose attention Draco had always wanted, good or bad, who Draco owed his life to twice over. Draco sighed, he still needed to do this for him. Even if Harry seemed like he was doing better, even if Harry sometimes snapped at him when Draco wanted to talk, Draco knew from his own experience that it wasn’t that simple. He wouldn’t be better overnight. He wished Harry would talk to him. It stung a little that he wouldn’t, but Draco suspected that Harry was avoiding his issues. And really, Draco knew it would be better if Harry had someone to talk to that was trained to deal with this sort of thing anyways. So, he could keep working on it for Harry.

And, really, _everyone_ wasn’t terrible, he reluctantly admitted. Many of the other eighth years were too dysfunctional to even be picking on Draco, not even having the energy to obviously ignore him. They were just doing their own thing… mostly their own fucked-up, terrible-coping-mechanisms thing, but Draco recognized even through his own anger and humiliation that most everyone was just trying to cope.

But, many of them were terrible, weren’t they? Their poor coping mechanisms didn’t change the fact that much of the student population, particularly the seventh years and a decent handful of the eighth years, were still using Draco for their own personal entertainment and distraction. He felt like one of the toys he used to damage as a child when he didn’t get his way, when he’d funnel all his spoiled anger into damaging his belongings in an overly-dramatic symbolic gesture. Only now, he was the battered toy, and his fellow students were causing the wreckage.

But, if he couldn’t forgive them for their shitty behavior because they were hurting, how could he forgive himself for all the shitty things he’d done? If the reason behind it all and the flawed human behind the behavior didn’t matter, than everything he’d done was even more unforgivable. After all, he’d had reasons at the time: how he’d been raised, that he was worried for his parents, that he was scared. Did it matter? Or was the end result the only thing that had value, that could be judged?

Draco pushed his way into his dorm room, his thoughts spinning round and round in circles.

After changing into some clean robes, Draco climbed into his bed, pulling the curtains tight. He pulled out his journal. He needed to organize his thoughts.

He wanted to forgive himself, not to excuse any of it, but to forgive himself enough to keep going. He didn’t know how to keep going if he didn’t. He was afraid that if he started allowing his anger to turn back into self-loathing that he was going to end up right back in the Mind Health Ward… or worse. He flipped back through his journal until he came to one of his lists from summer that was tucked between the pages.

Important things to remember:

* You are not a sum of your mistakes.

* You can be better.

* You can be whoever you want to be.

* You can’t change the past, but you can decide the future.

* Your decisions are in your control.

He took a deep breath. It was his life, and he could make it what he wanted. So what did he want? That really was the problem. Most of the time, he didn’t know anymore.

He knew one thing. Even with the frustration and brick walls he kept running into with his research, he enjoyed the sense of purpose this mind health project gave him. He felt that if he could do just this one good thing before he left Hogwarts forever that he could prove to himself that… well, he wasn't sure what. That he could be a better person? That he could change? Maybe that his life really was in his control and he could make decisions for himself?

He was doing something he wanted to do, for maybe the first time ever, something completely outside of familial and societal expectations that was just for him.

If he was going to decide who he wanted to be, he liked the idea of a version of himself that didn’t cause destruction and hurt to everyone around him. Where he’d used to revel in hurting others, he now only felt shame in the memories of his behavior. Perhaps, the extreme cruelty he’d witnessed over the past two years took some of the shine off. Seeing Bellatrix and Greyback crazed with glee after doing what could only be described as atrocious, barbaric things—things that Draco hadn’t even fantasized about when he was at his angriest and most bitter... His body shuddered involuntarily as he remembered, unwillingly, some of the more horrible things he’d witnessed. No, he would not become like them. He held onto the idea that maybe he could be the person that helped people heal instead of the person inflicting the damage. He held on to this thought like a lifeline.

***

Draco paced back in forth in the stacks of the library, trying to find his courage. Did he have courage to even find? He thought that was questionable after the past few years. Before he let his brain go down that rabbit-hole of self-loathing, he took a deep breath and stepped out of the aisle over to where some study tables were.

“Malfoy.” Granger looked up, surprised as he sat down across from her.

“Hello. Hi. I need your help with something,” he stated. Her eyebrows rose nearly into her hairline. “I think the school needs to bring in help for the students.”

“Okay,” she said slowly. “What does that have to do with me?”

Ok, here goes nothing. “I think a large portion of the student population needs help. Everyone is grieving and traumatized, and they aren’t coping well. Surely you’ve noticed how messed up just the eighth year class is? And I’m sure the other classes aren’t doing much better.”

“And what do you suggest, exactly?” She was looking at him with both curiosity and a not a small edge of distrust.

“I don’t have the books with me now, but this summer I read some Muggle Psychology books on trauma and there are programs that schools and workplaces have used when major events have happened. I’m not sure if we have ever had anything like that in place anywhere in the Wizarding community, really, but certainly getting some mind healers in here for students couldn’t hurt,” Draco explained, hoping she would understand.

“You were reading Muggle psychology books?” she asked carefully.

“I… yes. It’s a long story, but I basically spent half my summer in St. Mungo’s after, well, I’ll just be honest here, I tried to kill myself, and there was a bookcase of mind health books, but also psychology and psychiatry books in the library in the mind health ward. I read them while I was there, and, well, they were really interesting.” Draco put all his cards on the table.

He wanted her help, and his time with Harry was teaching him that there was seemingly only one way to convince Gryffindors of anything—pure unadulterated honesty. She had no reason to trust him as it was, and lying or twisting the truth would only convince her further that he could not be trusted.

“Is that why you sent me that letter?” She asked.

“In part... I was reading a section in a book that was about making amends, well, the book was about addiction, so it wasn’t really what I was dealing with, not that that matters, but the apology part seemed important. It seemed like something I needed to do, so, well yes, I wrote a lot of letters over the summer. I felt like I needed to start finding ways to change, to be different than I was, so I could, I don’t know hate myself less and start to make amends...” he said, rambling a bit, starting to feel exasperated by the direction of this conversation.

He had not been planning on going through _all_ of his mental health history from the summer with Granger, but once he started being honest, it seemed like he had a hard time turning off the tap. Speaking openly and honestly was not a skill in which most Slytherins had practice, which became extremely clear to Draco every time he awkwardly attempted it.

“Okay,” she said. “So, I still don’t understand what this has to do with me, though.”

“I was going to put together a plan to propose to the board, but I’m, well, I’m stuck. From my research and plans that have been proposed successfully, it seems that whenever money is involved, the board wants to see precedence. And, there’s no precedent for this, at least at Hogwarts. I think the only precedence may be Muggle.”

“And, you, what? Think I just have all this information to provide to you because I’m muggle-born?” She sounded irritated and more than a little defensive.

“No! Well not exactly that. I wanted to ask for your help anyways, because you are- well good at this sort of thing. You know- helping people and all that.” Draco cringed; he was not doing a good job explaining this.

“I’m sorry,” he continued. “I know I have been terrible to you, beyond terrible, really—there probably aren’t words for how awful I’ve been. I know that,” Draco said honestly. “I’m trying to change, I really am. And, I would do this myself, but I have no idea how to do Muggle research. I have no access to it, and listen, I really do think that they have better systems in place, okay? I think they know a lot more about this topic than the Wizarding community. I know that sounds rich coming from me, but I am realizing that I had a lot of really dumb and harmful views, and I’m trying to relearn everything. But, I need help.” He laid it all out. If she still wanted nothing to do with him after... well he supposed that was fair, and he’d leave her be.

“I’ll be honest, I’m really not interested in taking time away from my studies this year to work with you on, well, anything.” She kept a level gaze at him.

“Here.” In a last ditch effort, Draco thrust some parchment towards her. It was the outline he had made of his ideas connected to the research and then the issues he kept running into. He’d been using it to keep his thoughts organized, but thought it might be the most compelling argument he had for her help. “Can you… will you look at what I have? Please?”

She took the parchment and looked at him for a moment, as if sizing him up. “Let me think about this. I’ll look at this later, and I’m not saying I am going to help, but I’ll consider it.”

“Okay,” he breathed out, “Thank you.”

He nodded as he left her to her studying and found another table in a tucked away corner. That went as well as could have been expected, he supposed. Now he’d just have to wait, and hope that she would help.

He pulled out his charms essay and was about to get to work when Potter plopped down across from him.

“Hi,” Harry said with a smile.

“Hi.” Draco looked at him, startled. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, why?”

“You are sitting with me. In the library,” Draco said, confused. “I mean, not that I’m not glad to see you! I just…” Draco trailed off. He hasn’t been sure Harry was even going to talk to him again after their last walk.

“Is that okay? Can I sit here while I work?” Harry looked simultaneously nervous and defiant, as if about to argue with Draco if he dared suggest that he couldn’t sit here.

“Of course. But, don’t you want to sit with Granger?”

Harry laughed, “No, I most definitely do not want to be lectured on how far behind I am in all my classes, and how I’m never going to pass my NEWTs if I don’t come up with a 5-point plan of action.”

Draco laughed. He’d never been the recipient of Granger’s rants, but now sharing a common room with her, he’d certainly heard them at a distance.

“Well, I suppose that’s fine then,” Draco said. Harry smiled and started pulling books out of his bag.

Draco went back to his charms essay, feeling both pleasantly surprised and a little self conscious, never having spent time alone with Harry beyond their private talks by the lake. He wondered what it meant—were they friends now? Surely that would be weird, right? As weird as it may be, he couldn’t suppress the fluttering, hopeful feeling at the thought of Harry being his friend.

He covertly glanced up at Harry from behind his lashes. Somehow a couple of secret meetings didn’t seem as real as Harry sitting across from him in plain sight of the whole school (or really, the five other students who were actually in that section of the library). It was nice, just having Harry nearby. There was a warm comfort in his presence.

He tried to clear his thoughts with a small shake of his head and went back to his essay. At this rate, he wasn’t going to have anything to turn in tomorrow. A jolt of anxiety at the thought of having to explain to Flitwick that he hadn’t completed his essay was enough to pull him back into the moment and get to work.

***

The following week found him once again in the library, as he continued to try to research how to best propose this to the board and, if needed, the Ministry.

He was having a hard time concentrating.

It had been another terrible week of being ignored in classes, unable to participate in lessons, sitting alone and being alone at all times. Draco was starting to feel like he was disappearing, becoming even less visible, less corporeal than the ghosts that roamed the school. The shunning from his housemates had spread and many of the students in other houses now seemed to be participating with the unspoken understanding that Draco was not to be spoken to. In fact, he wasn’t sure that anyone had even spoken to him since Harry in the library. His existence wasn’t even to be acknowledged. It was far more effective retribution than Draco ever thought it could be.

His short conversations with Harry and Granger the previous week had been probably the last time Draco had even used his voice. And before that? He didn’t even know anymore. He was starting to feel a bit crazed. His thoughts felt constantly disorganized, and he was catastrophizing more than ever, with thoughts running in loops over and over again.

Social exile had always seemed more dignified, more befitting of pure-blood culture. He’d always thought it was effective, but far less brutal than throwing hexes around, or worse, throwing punches like a common Muggle. Now, he was starting to understand that this was far more damaging.

At the beginning of the school year, Draco thought he’d dodged a killing curse. He would only be ignored by his housemates; these were the students he didn’t need to worry about watching out for stray curses from. His fellow pure-bloods would be refined and dignified and simply _ignore_ him. But, after two months of this, he was starting to understand that this brutal unending freeze out, which cut Draco off from any human contact, was actually worse in many ways. It left him alone with his thoughts, untethered from any community or support system. People weren’t meant to be completely alone, completely isolated.

Day by day, Draco felt the depression sneaking back in. The occasional owl correspondance with his mother, about her flowers usually, wasn’t nearly enough to keep the maudlin thoughts at bay. By that morning, he’d barely been able to pull himself out of bed.

Having his project to focus on was starting to become a bit of a lifeline. Originally, he’d been primarily concerned about his classmates. With some introspection, which he had plenty of time for those days, he was starting to think the near obsession he was developing with helping everyone else was probably a way of dealing with his guilt. Draco found himself inexplicably wanting to help even the students who were being cruel to him—a behavior completely unbefitting a Malfoy. There was also an increasingly selfish component to getting some mind healers into the school. Originally, he hadn't been at all concerned about seeing another mind healer, himself. But, after these past two months, the thought of having anyone at all to talk to was enough to push through his fatigue and hopelessness and try to make this work. But, he couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t even read the words in front of his eyes.

So, his compulsive need to dispel some of his guilt and his need to talk to someone about everything going on this year kept him moving steadily forward with his research for this project. Draco also found his desire to help Harry, the other student in the entire school who had been kind to him this year was just under the surface, fueling him forward, depression be damned.

A loud thump pulled him away from further ruminating. He looked up to see Hermione standing on the other side of the table, her large and overstuffed book bag on the table clearly the cause of the noise.

She started pulling books out of her bag. “I read your plan and research, and did some of my own. I couldn’t find much on Wizarding programs, like you said, they just don’t seem to exist. But, I was able to order some Muggle books on community mental health programs, trauma recovery and I even got a few on proposal writing. I know we may have to adjust it for our audience. I haven’t been able to dig too deep into how to word things for the school board, but I thought it may also give us some ideas.

“I was also thinking, we should probably think a little larger than just Hogwarts. I agree with you that we definitely need some help and intervention here, but really the whole of Wizarding England is trying to recover right now. And, the more I looked into this, the more problems I found. Did you know that other than one small ward, probably the one you were in at St. Mungo’s, there is no mental health service to speak of? Which, really! This is a much bigger problem than even what you outlined.” She plopped down and looked at him expectantly.

“Right,” he said, still recovering from his surprise, “so… you are helping me then?”

“This doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven you.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.” She started handing him notes.

They started outlining what information they needed to get, first. It seemed that their history would go unspoken as they worked towards this common goal that Granger had clearly taken up as her own after she did some initial research and recognized the scope of the problem.

Emotionally and mentally, Draco tried to pull it together. It wouldn’t do any good to let Granger see how close he was to losing the plot. He sat there feeling simultaneously grateful for her help and really even just her presence next to him; someone talking to him like he was a real living person was almost more than he could ask for these days. But he also felt a strange detachment as he sat there huddled over books with her. It was more than a little bizarre sitting in the library, working with Granger as if this were a perfectly normal thing they did together, and it was also strange to be talking to, well, anyone. And his thoughts kept spinning over worse-case scenarios and all the ways this whole project and plan could go wrong.

He did his best to push it all away, his depression, his anxiety and loneliness and get to work. He needed to show her that he was serious about this, and hopefully _not_ show her what a mess he was. He set to work.

A few hours later, his eyes felt like sandpaper. He was pretty sure he’d not been blinking regularly while reading all these books. Can you forget to blink? Wasn’t that supposed to be something your body just did? He sighed.

“Do you want to leave it here tonight?” He glanced over at the nearest window, it was completely dark out. He was pretty sure it had still been daylight when they’d started, and he wondered if it was near curfew. They’d also clearly missed dinner.

“I suppose we should. Is it alright if I take all these notes? I want to organize them better so that we can more easily refer to them later.” Hermione blew a wayward curl out of her eye.

Draco nodded and slowly stretched, his body protesting at having been in one position for too long.

“Granger, thank you. Really, I appreciate your help.”

She nodded as she gathered her bags and left the library without another word.

Draco waited a few moments so that he didn’t have to awkwardly walk near her, but not with her on the way back to their dorm and then took his time walking back.

When he got to the common room, he headed over towards the round table in the corner of the room that had been at some point in the past month, designated as the unofficial eighth year dorm food pantry. It was almost constantly full of snacks and food that Weasley was getting from the house elves. Draco supposed the house elves must really like him, as he was unaware that food could be acquired outside of mealtimes at Hogwarts. He’d certainly never seen anyone in Slytherin manage it. If there had been extra food in his dorm, it was always sent by a parent, and never openly shared without a trade.

Draco stood over the table deciding what food to grab.

“Hey, where have you been?”

Draco startled and looked over to see that Harry had suddenly appeared beside him. He wasn’t used to anyone talking to him in the common room. Or, anywhere, his brain traitorously added.

“Oh- I’m working on something with Hermione,” he replied, unsure of how much detail he wanted to go into just yet in case it was all for nothing. And, he was frankly a bit afraid of jinxing the whole situation.

“Oh, alright. I just noticed you weren’t at dinner. I didn’t realize you were working with her. Is it something for class?”

“It’s sort of an extra project. I don’t really want to go into the details just yet, until we’re further along... if you don’t mind.” Draco gave him a smile so that he didn’t feel blown off and grabbed a couple rolls, a piece of cheese and an apple. He headed towards one of the couches, pleasantly surprised when Harry followed and sat down next to him.

“Ok, not a problem. I won’t ask again, you can tell me later if you want.”

Draco ate his food while Harry sat next to him and told him all about the quidditch practice he decided to watch that evening, how he missed quidditch, and his thoughts on how the Ravenclaw-Gryffindor game was going to go that weekend.

Draco couldn’t understand what Harry was doing—why was he hanging out with him like they were long-time friends in the common room. No one hung out with Draco in the common room. It was practically school code that he was to be totally and fully ignored in all public spaces. In the library, they’d been both quietly studying, just happening to be at the same table—Draco had convinced himself days ago that hadn’t really counted as being social—Harry just wanted someone to sit with that wouldn’t nag him. And, their secret walks didn’t mean they were friends, it was hidden, something Draco convinced himself that Harry was probably ashamed of and kept private. But this was different. This was just... hanging out, like friends.

Draco tried to leave it alone, enjoy whatever this was for as long as it lasted. Were they friends? Could they be actual friends? Maybe it didn’t matter, it could just be whatever Harry was willing to give him. He could be happy and content in this sort-of-friendship. If nothing else, this conversation with Harry, having someone look at him, and talk to him and listen, it grounded Draco in a way nothing else could. Maybe he would be okay. Draco smiled a genuine smile as he listened to Harry’s story about Seamus catching his entire robe on fire during Herbology.

  
  



	6. Chapter 6

“It seems we keep coming back to the same problem. The biggest obstacle we’re going to have is funding, even if we are just talking about the school, and not a larger program. From what I heard earlier this summer, they were using quite a bit of Hogwarts’ discretionary funding for the repairs this summer.” Hermione flipped through her notes, organized in a way only she understood.

“If Hogwarts still had that funding,” she continued, “there’s a possibility that we could have just taken this to the board, with Muggle precedence and had a shot at getting the school-wide program up and running. But without that fund, the money will have to come from the Ministry. Since there’s no community health department, that means the money would have to come from other departments, and no one is going to want to give up their departments money.”

“If we went the larger program route like you suggested, though, couldn’t we wrap up the funding into that? If it got approval, of course.” Draco asked.

He wanted to bang his head on the desk. He decided he roundly hated bureaucracy. They kept thinking they had a way to move forward when they would find another problem that would hold them back. Or more accurately, they found the same problem over and over again. Each time he thought they found a way around it, they ran into another roadblock in their plan. It was probably good his familial expectations had completely washed up, he thought cynically, as it seemed he would have hated constantly trying to work the bureaucratic system.

The irony was not lost on him that had his family not lost all their money in war reparations, he could have funded this program outright. But had they not been involved in the war, he wouldn’t have been trying to create this program in the first place.

“Did we hear back from the Mind Healers at St. Mungos?” Hermione asked.

“Yes, they are very interested in building some sort of community program to help those with issues from the war. And, they agree that Hogwarts probably needs someone on staff for the next few years. The director wrote back and said that he’s a little concerned about staffing, as there are a limited amount of mind healers available. But, he has some connections outside of England and if we can find the funding, he thinks he can find additional healers that would be willing to come in for the next year to help with the war recovery.” Draco had written to Healer Smyth first, and the healer had been so supportive about the idea, he immediately got his director involved.

“They are also willing to put together a team to develop what the program might look like, since we’d need their expertise on that,” Draco said. Hermione nodded; this is what they’d been hoping for. Draco continued, “so, basically we just need to draft out the general idea and get the funding. Which is, of course, the problem we’re having.”

It was already late-October, and they seemed no closer to getting a plan in action. Draco was getting increasingly worried about his classmates. How long until one of them made a decision that they couldn’t come back from? Even though overall Harry seemed to be doing better, Draco had a sneaking suspicion that he was still cutting himself and hiding it from Draco.

His thoughts drifted back to how frustrating it was to not have the money in his vaults to solve this problem—the fact that money was the thing stopping this in its tracks was beyond frustrating. Suddenly he had a thought.

“Where’s the war reparation money going?” He asked. “If it wasn’t going to the repairs at Hogwarts, where is it going?”

Hermione looked up suddenly, “I don’t know. I don’t think they’ve released to the public any plans for that money.”

“But it was all already collected right? I know my family’s money was. So where did it go?”

“Right. I need to write some letters.” Hermione jumped up, stuffed her books and papers in her bag and took off out of the library. Draco sat there not quite sure what just happened.

***

A week later, on his way to class, one of the fears weighing on Draco’s mind finally transpired.

“You don’t think I remember you? You were one of the Carrows’ lackeys” Michael Corner had his wand out, pointing at a seventh year Slytherin student, Thaddius Watte. He had told everyone to call him Thad, and from Draco remembered of him, he’d always seemed a bit dim. The younger boy squared off to Corner.

“What’s it to you?”

“You think you can wander these halls after everything you did? Torturing first years and bringing them to those monsters?” Corner was yelling now. Students were gathering around, but keeping a good distance in case it turned violent. Draco was behind two rows of students, able to still see clearly as he was at least a head taller than most of the younger students.

“Aww are you worried about the baby firsties,” Thaddius mocked Corner. Yep, still an idiot, Draco thought cringing.

Corner had his wand up in a flash. “Diffindo!”

Everything seemed to slow down as Draco watched a large cut form on the side of Thaddius’s neck. The young man dropped his wand to put both hands on the gash. It fortunately seemed to have missed his airway, but he was losing a lot of blood. Draco shuddered as he was reminded of a similar incident in the bathroom a couple years prior.

Corner raised his wand again.

“No!” Ron Weasley came flying out of the crowd and tackled Corner. “No! We are not doing this!” He wrangled Corner’s wand away from him, but continued to hold him down. “You two there-” Ron pointed at two older boys at the edge of the crowd, “get him to the infirmary fast!”

The two boys jumped to action, pushing through the crowd so Thaddius could get through. The cut looked bad and he looked weak on his legs. One of the boys must have realized that and helped prop him up as they walked almost at a run to the infirmary.

“Everyone go! We’re done here.” Ron yelled at the crowd, still half on top of Corner holding him down.

Draco moved with the rush of the crowd around him to his next class. Fuck. This was bad.

His next class was arithmancy. Only a few students took the NEWT-level class, so it was traditionally combined with the sixth year class, with each working on different levels of project difficulty. Even still, there were few students there that day. Hermione came in a few minutes after Draco and sat next to him, to Draco’s surprise. While they got on well enough while working, she was still generally standoffish to him outside of their working meetings.

“Did you hear what happened?” she whispered to him.

“Yeah I saw it,” Draco replied. “I don’t know what happened after, but I saw the fight. Thank Merlin Ron stopped it when he did.”

Hermione nodded. “I hear the Slytherin student got to the infirmary in time.”

“We really need to do something. Do you think we should just talk to McGonagall about what we have so far?” he asked.

“About that, what time are you done with classes today?”

“Around 4:00, why?”

“Ok, good, meet me in the library after.” She whispered and then turned towards Professor Vector who was beginning her lecture.

  
  


The rest of the day passed slowly for Draco. He was feeling nerved up from watching another student nearly get their throat slit in the middle of the hallway. Classes were a joke for the rest of the day, as students weren’t able to concentrate and rumors were flying around about what happened to both Michael Corner and Thaddius Watt. Everyone just whispered and talked, not to him of course, through the rest of his classes.

He sat through his final class beyond agitated; everyone seemed almost excited by the gossip. Draco felt a little sick at the thought that he’d been like that not too long ago—reveling in other’s misfortunes as long as they provided some entertainment value. That part of him had been left behind in the war.

After being forced to participate in actual torture, he had lost all enjoyment from anyone else’s suffering—big or small.

When he got to the library, he found Hermione already there with her notes organized all over the table.

“Hi. So, your idea—about the reparation money. I wrote a few letters and found out that the money was just basically being absorbed into the Ministry for ‘repairs.’ I think they were planning on just keeping the money and spreading it out amongst departments. I’m not sure if any departments in particular were getting large chunks of it, or the details, but _very_ little of it went to Hogwarts repairs under the guise that they were still processing it. So, the Hogwarts repairs came out of its own funds.”

“What? But that’s so much money!”

“I _know_,” Hermione stressed. “But this is good, because this means we can get our funding.”

“How does this mean we can get our funding? There’s no way the Ministry is going to give up this money.”

“Oh but I think they will. At least, they will when the public gets behind this idea and they have to explain why there’s no money for it,” she said with a raised eyebrow.

Draco felt exceedingly glad they were on the same side for once. “And how are we going to do that?”

“Well it just so happens I know someone who owns a newspaper and I think would completely support our idea.”

***

“Malfoy?” Draco blinked his eyes open, confused. He had been dreaming of Quidditch; the snitch was a purple Pygmy Puff that kept biting him every time he tried to grab it. He propped himself up on an elbow and frowned as he looked towards his slightly open curtains unsure of who or what woke him.

“Oh, sorry.” A voice came through the empty gap in the curtain. Was he still dreaming then?

Suddenly Harry’s head and only his head appeared in the gap. Right, the invisibility cloak. Draco fell back to the bed.

“Potter. It’s the middle of the night—what’s going on?” Draco asked drowsily, feeling almost drugged from having been roused from a deep sleep.

Harry hesitated, “I’m- I’m sorry to wake you. I’m just having a bad night.” He worried his bottom lip and looked off to the side like he was considering where else he might go.

“Oh… Are you okay?” Draco mumbled. He wanted to help, but felt his eyes involuntarily closing back up.

“I thought- I mean, I just need some company.”

“Sure, it’s fine, just… I’m sleeping.” Draco let his eyes close, but lifted the covers in invitation.

Harry hesitated for only a second and then crawled into bed next to Draco, balling up his cloak and stuffing it behind the pillows as he settled down.

“Night, Draco,” Harry whispered as Draco fell quickly asleep.

Draco woke slowly, feeling safe and warm. As feeling came back to his limbs, he started to realize he was pinned down. Alarm quickly replaced the feeling of contentment; his eyes flew open to see messy black hair about an inch below his chin. Draco froze as the very foggy memories of last night came back—Potter.

Harry was in his bed, and apparently slept like a cuddle-starved octopus. Their legs were tangled up, with one of Harry’s legs draped over Draco’s lower half. One arm wrapped completely around Draco’s midsection, and his head resting on Draco’s chest. Right.

Draco’s brain went into overdrive trying to figure out what to do. Should he just go back to sleep? Pretend he didn’t notice they were cuddling? Should he try to extricate himself from Harry’s limbs and sneak away?

Somehow amidst the panic, Draco’s body still managed to start to react to the cute boy in his bed as he fully woke up. Which, of course, only increased the panic. Draco tried settling his breath so as to not wake the other man. He was pretty sure that Harry would be fairly unimpressed with waking up to not only hugging Draco, but finding him fully aroused. He closed his eyes while he tried to organize his thoughts enough to work out a way out of this situation.

“Mmgggh.” Harry started to stir. Draco’s eyes popped back open; he could no longer remember how to breathe. As Harry woke up, he slowly pulled his legs back, and leaned slightly away from Draco. As he looked up at him, eyes half-lidded, he smiled a slow smile, seeming to realize where he was, Harry’s eyes popped open fully.

“Good morning,” Harry said, clearing his throat slightly.

“Morning,” Draco replied carefully.

“Er- thanks for letting me sleep here last night. I was kind of a wreck last night,” Harry said while subtly stretching away from Draco.

“Right. It’s not a problem at all, really. I’m glad you, you know, didn’t try to work through it alone. Seriously anytime you need company at night, it’s fine.” Draco immediately wanted to slap himself.

What was he doing? No. No falling for straight boys- no crushes, no wanting, no any of that. Even if Harry didn’t freak out at their positions this morning, that didn’t mean Draco should go looking for more cuddling. Even if the cuddling was really nice and warm and felt safe.

“Did you want to talk about it?” Draco asked, trying to refocus.

“Not really.” Harry shrugged, and then sat up and peeked out the curtains to see the sun streaming through the dorm windows and then pulled them back.

“It’s Saturday,” Harry stated, looking at Draco like he was deciding something.

“Yes, it is.” Draco was not sure where he was going with this.

“Did you want to maybe go to Hogsmeade today?” Harry asked. Draco looked at him confused, surely he didn’t mean-

“I need a new quill and, er, a few supplies for potions” Harry continued, hastily, when Draco didn’t answer right away.

Right. Errands. Draco cleared his throat. “Well I was going to get some homework done today since I’m meeting with Hermione tomorrow-”

“For your secret project-”

“Yes, for our secret project.” Draco hesitated and considered going to Hogsmeade with Harry; he had been completely and decidedly avoiding the village all term. He didn’t want to go out into public, away from the ‘absolutely no fighting’ policy of Hogwarts where he felt at least somewhat protected. Plus, the Three Broomsticks. He did not want to go anywhere near that place. He had written his apology to Rosmerta, but was under no illusions that his apology was accepted.

“But, I suppose I could go for a little bit,” Draco continued. What? He tried to keep his face calm while one part of his brain screamed at the other part of his brain. Why did he always do dumb things when Potter was involved? All the while, the traitorous side of his brain quietly supplied that he knew exactly why. Fuck.

“Great!” Harry said brightly with a genuine smile. “I’ll go get dressed and we should probably grab some breakfast first, and then we can head out!”

Harry pulled his invisibility coat from behind the pillows and started putting it around him. At least Draco didn't have to worry about any other eighth years seeing Harry leaving Draco’s room and sneaking back to his own this morning.

After he was gone—or Draco assumed he was gone, since he was now invisible—Draco scrubbed his face. He groaned quietly as he got up and headed to his trunk for his shower supplies. He was just going to have to pull it together and make it through this Hogsmeade trip. He looked across the room and saw Longbottom at the edge of his bed, tying up his very muddy outdoor work boots. He raised an eyebrow at Draco when he saw him.

“Good night?” he asked.

Draco stared at him, frozen.

“Your silencing charms only usually hold until early morning. Not that I’ve tested them daily, but you know, sometimes you snore a bit.” Longbottom looked far too amused.

Draco felt his face quickly heat up and was sure his coloring could give a shrivelfig a run for its money. Completely incapable of working out a response, he grabbed his toiletries, nodded to Longbottom quickly, and walked as quickly as possible without actually breaking into a run towards the showers.

Instead of a nice, relaxing shower, he spent fifteen minutes under the spray feeling completely mortified, and catastrophizing every possible scenario of how this was going to turn out—some less likely (Harry punching him in the face when he heard the rumors) than others (Harry just wanting to keep his distance). But Draco was convinced that if Harry found out that anyone thought they were… what? In a relationship? Intimate? Hooking up? Oh Merlin, Draco groaned. It didn’t matter—it all clearly ended up with Harry not wanting anything to do with him. Plus, the school—everyone would be unbearable. The rumors, the attention, the glares.

A few years ago, he loved nearly any attention he could get, but these days, just the thought of people looking at him was enough to send him towards a panic-attack. And now, now they were going to go to Hogsmeade? Together? That would just be the nail in the proverbial gossip coffin. What was he thinking? What was Harry thinking? This is what students did on dates. Or, in groups with friends, but with just the two of them going? Clearly, Harry was too oblivious to realize what everyone would assume about him, about them. Draco groaned and dropped his head against the stone wall of the shower.

  
  


He ate his breakfast at his usual empty end of the Slytherin table, getting increasingly flustered as Harry kept flashing him a smile every time they made eye contact. Over half a decade of habit was hard to break, and Draco found himself glance across the Great Hall every few minutes towards the Gryffindor table even as he tried to stop himself. Now, instead of glares and insults, Draco found himself the recipient of smiles and fond looks from the other man and fought to keep back the blush that threatened to cover his face. He hurried through his food, needing to get out of there.

Draco had never done particularly well with masking his emotions, something his father was always quick to criticize. He feared the newly-developed, quite embarrassing feelings he was harboring for a certain individual would be broadcast across his face to the entire student population if he stayed in the room a minute longer. He forced down the last bite of toast and nearly sprinted out the doors and towards the main castle doors. He could wait for Harry here near the entrance.

Since it wasn’t an official Hogsmeade weekend for the younger students, he was thankfully alone as he found a windowsill to sit on while he waited. He did not need to wait long, though, as only a minute later Harry came striding into view.

“Hey!” Harry exclaimed, eyes bright.

“Hi. Er- Are you ready? To go to Hogsmeade, I mean.” Draco cringed at his own awkwardness.

Harry nodded and gestured towards the door for Draco to lead. They walked out into the crisp air. It was one of those rare late October days when a warm, bright sun combated the cool breeze, keeping them comfortable without cloaks as they made their way towards the village.

They walked in silence, but Draco could see Harry sneaking glances at him out of the corner of his eye. He wondered if Harry was realizing how strange it was for them to be going to Hogsmeade together, like friends. Or something else, the traitorous part of his brain whispered.

“Did you hear that Corner was expelled?” Harry broke the silence finally. “They skipped right over the suspension because of, you know, how serious it was. He’d apparently already been caught fighting once, so they decided enough was enough.”

“I had heard. I wasn’t sure if it was just rumors—you know how the school is.”

“Yeah, I heard it from Hermione who heard it from a teacher.”

“Well, it’s probably good. He was… well dangerous.” Draco had very much feared that Corner was going to come after him at some point.

“Yeah, he was pretty out of control,” Harry agreed. “I feel bad though, because he clearly wasn’t doing well and probably needed help. Like you were saying a couple weeks ago, it’s not like anyone in our class is doing well.”

“You seem like you are doing better.” Draco looked over at Harry, unsure if that was true or just what he hoped was true.

Harry shrugged. “Mostly. Some days are better than others. I really appreciate you letting me stay with you last night. This isn’t the best time of year for me, it was when my parents… well, and I know it was probably not how you wanted to spend your night, but I, er, I don’t know that I could have made it through last night without…” he trailed off slightly gesturing to the arm Draco had healed in the bathroom.

“I really did mean it when I said it’s fine, and if you ever are having a bad night again you can come over anytime. Or, if you ever want to talk.”

He hesitated for a moment, still deciding on whether to share the next bit. “You should know, though, my silencing charms apparently wear off by morning, or so Longbottom informed me this morning. So… erm, he may have heard you and I’m not sure exactly what he thought, but he may have gotten the wrong idea, so I understand if you don’t want people to think that or you don’t come by again or-”

Harry laughed abruptly, “Oh! Well, er- sorry if I accidentally got you involved in new school rumors.” Harry seemed entirely unbothered by the whole thing himself. Draco looked down as they neared the village and felt himself blushing again.

“So… where would you like to go then?” Harry changed the topic as they got to the main street.

“You said you needed potion supplies?” Draco offered.

“Oh, right. I, er- Yes, I need a couple things,” Harry mumbled and turned them in the direction of the apothecary. Draco wondered if he had inadvertently made things awkward between them bringing up the Longbottom thing.

Once in the apothecary, Harry seemed to pick out a few ingredients haphazardly. Draco nearly offered to help, but didn’t want to seem like he was insulting Harry’s potion making abilities. Particularly because he’d insulted them so many times in the past, Draco was afraid it might remind Harry of reasons he didn't really want to be friends with him.

That said, Draco was getting increasingly concerned at Potter’s ingredient-getting, as it seemed he wasn’t really checking labels and many ingredients, like the Dragon’s tears Harry had just picked up but then put back down, could have different properties depending on when it was collected. This important information was often labeled in small print or symbols on the lower portion of the label, but Harry barely seemed to be looking at the labels. After the fourth bottle that Harry quickly picked up and put back down barely glancing at, Draco cringed, concern and exasperation getting the better of him.

“Potter, wait- no. You really need to be reading these more carefully.” Draco removed the canister of ground fluxweed from Harry’s hand that he had just picked up.

He sighed and continued as patiently as he could manage, “Look—see this part of the label, it describes the time of year, time of day, and moon cycle that it was harvested in. Plus, you really should just get unaltered fluxweed and grind it yourself; it will be fresher and more potent. What potion is this being used for? I know most of us are working on a variety of independent projects for NEWT preparation on top of classwork, so if you have a specific potion in mind, that would help to know.”

Harry blanched a little. Draco groaned internally; he’d really tried to be as kind as possible, maybe he came off more condescending than he thought?

“I, er- well, I erm-” Harry faltered. “It’s just, you know, basic potions ingredients… nothing, I mean not for anything specific. Just to make sure I had some of the, well basics… for basic potions...” He trailed off.

“Oh, okay. I’m sorry, I really was just trying to help. I can help, I mean, if you want.” Draco tried to smooth it over a bit.

“Right. Okay. Sure—I erm—I need fluxweed, and… wiggentree bark, and… er- thyme.” Harry stammered out.

“Why not just use the Potions supply cabinet for those?” Draco frowned; those were all pretty standard ingredients.

“Oh, I er- … I ran into an issue a week or two ago where one of the main ingredients I needed was out, and I thought maybe it was a better idea just to have my own supply. I, er- really need to get through potions this year, so I thought…” Harry trailed off and wandered to the side of the room.

“Ok, well... I guess that makes sense. Here, I’ll grab some good standard varieties of those for you,” Draco replied. He hadn’t noticed the potions supply room running low on anything lately, but he knew seventh (and now eighth) year students were apt to get a little neurotic about their classes given all the pressure they were under for NEWTs. Draco swiftly moved through the store and grabbed the ingredients, handing them over to Harry, who just watched him intently.

Harry quickly paid for them and they left the shop and headed down the road. Other than a few lingering glances at Harry and him, Draco was surprised to find that everyone mostly ignored him. He made sure to steer them to the far side of the street when they passed the Three Broomsticks, but the day was turning out to be far more uneventful than Draco had possibly hoped any trip into the village would have been.

As they passed Madam Puddifoot’s, Draco’s brain filled itself with images of him and Harry sitting close together at a table and sharing tea and cakes. He cleared his throat loudly, “So, a new quill, you also needed? You said?” Pull it together, Draco, he chastised himself internally.

“Right, yes, a new quill,” Harry replied quickly. They headed to Scrivenshaft's. Draco was relieved to note that Harry didn’t need an intervention on quill selection. He kept that thought to himself though, not wanting to embarrass or insult Harry. He didn’t actually think that Harry was a terrible student, but he certainly was oblivious sometimes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've been reading as it's being posted (before this chapter was posted): After getting some feedback, I've changed a little bit in the earlier chapters with Hermione. I am slowing down her forgiveness of Draco. She hasn't forgiven him yet in the new version, but nothing else has changed (they continue to work together, I'm just making her slower to forgive). So that will play out more in future chapters. 
> 
> If you've just started reading: ignore the note above and carry on :-). 
> 
> Thanks for reading! And thanks to all my wonderful betas as I work my way through my first fanfic.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm putting this project officially on hiatus. 
> 
> I've been working on other projects and having a hard time coming back to this fic. I'll try to get back to it at some point, but I've just lost a bit of steam on it. Thanks for reading and sorry for any disappointment for those that were following.

As the second week of November rolled around, classes and homework had picked up for all students, and the library was becoming more crowded.

Tuesday evening, Draco tried to locate an empty table to work at, but found every one already in use. It was quickly made clear that he would not be welcome to join a partially occupied table, even the ones with only one other student. Every time he eyed an empty spot too closely, books and bags and parchment were quickly spread out filling the space.

His heart skipped for a moment when he saw Hermione; maybe she’d let him sit with her. They still hadn’t talked about their history after his apology, but she was always polite to him. As he looked closer, he realized she was working with several seventh year students on what looked to be an Arithmancy project, and their table was completely full.

With a sigh, he headed back to the eighth year common room. One of the unforeseen benefits of having split off the eighth year students was that the common room was generally quiet and filled with students studying during the week. Since everyone in the house was in their NEWT year, there wasn’t nearly as much time for games and socialization most nights. The weekends could still get a bit rowdy—Draco generally hid away in his bed on Friday and Saturday nights—but the week days were often more quiet than the library. The eighth year students had mostly taken to socializing in their rooms or elsewhere in the castle lest their fellow students hex them for interrupting their studies.

Based on how crowded the common room was, he guessed he was not the only one who planned on studying all evening. While a couple of the overstuffed chairs were still open, nearly all of the tables were at capacity with books and parchment covering all surfaces and students crammed around them. He found a small unoccupied two-person table against the wall, and set to work. Not five minutes later, the chair across from him was pulled out and moved around to the side of the table closer to Draco. Harry slid into it, bookbag hanging off his shoulder.

“Hi,” Draco said, surprised. He hadn’t seen Harry around much over the past week.

“Hello. Mind if I join you?” Harry asked.

“Not at all.” Draco scooted his books over to give Harry more room.

“Harry!” Harry turned in his chair to see who had called out his name. Seamus was waving his arm to get his attention like he wasn’t only 10 feet away. More than a few annoyed sighs were heard throughout the room at Seamus’s unnecessary volume which had interrupted everyone’s concentration.

“Shhh!” Padma Patil glared at Seamus.

“We can make room for you over here, just bring your chair over!” he loudly whispered and then pulled a face at Padma. Seamus, Dean and Ron started rearranging their parchments and stacking up their books.

“Oh. No, I’m fine here. But, er- thanks.” Harry whispered back just as loudly, and then turned back around and ducked his head down into the book he’d just pulled out. With his back to the rest of the room, Harry missed the surprised looks of more than a few of their classmates. Interestingly, Ron only rolled his eyes, but a few others’ expressions were slowly turning to appall and disgust once the initial shock had passed.

Draco looked back at his essay so as to not invite any sort of direct argument from the other students. Draco didn’t know if the animosity was directed at him for daring to tarnish their Chosen One with his presence, or if they were angry that Harry was ruining their game of “Malfoy is invisible.” Probably a little bit of both.

Draco ignored the stares and set back to work, secretly gloating that Harry chose his company out of everyone in the room.

“Did you finish your Potions essay?” Harry asked, looking over at Draco’s Charms homework laid out in front of him.

“No, but I’m nearly done. Did you need help?”

“Do you mind?” Harry asked.

“Shhh!” Someone, probably Padma, loudly shushed from the other side of the room.

Draco rolled his eyes and cast a _Muffliato_ around them so they could talk without being hexed by their overworked and overstressed classmates.

“It’s fine- I was just working on my Charms essay, but that one isn’t due until Friday.” Draco shuffled through his stack of parchment in his bag until he found his Potions essay.

“Thanks,” Harry sounded relieved. “I’m pretty lost right now.”

“You don’t say,” Draco said, unable to help himself.

“Hey!” Harry elbowed his arm.

“It’s not really the most well kept secret in the school that you are pants at Potions, you know. Speaking of, are you ever going to tell me how you were able to suddenly get so much better in sixth year? Was Hermione doing all your work or did you confound Slughorn regularly?” Draco needled him, unable to contain a smile.

Harry laughed, “I’m surprised you remember that.”

“Well, first, you were suddenly better than me at Potions. And second, Slughorn waxed philosophical about your talent during every class. It was pretty hard to miss.”

Harry blushed to his roots, and scowled a little, “Yeah, well that part was more annoying.”

“What you didn’t enjoy the Slug Club?” Draco tried to keep the edge of bitterness out of his voice, but he remembered the snub a little too vividly.

“Definitely not.”

“I seem to remember you still going to the parties.”

“You should talk- I distinctly remember you sneaking into one even though you weren’t invited,” Harry shot back.

“So are you going to tell me how you did it?”

“Er- well, Slughorn seemed to invite anyone that he thought would be influential or eventually do favors for him, so I’m sure that my fa-”

Draco laughed, indignation fading. “No, not get invited to the stupid club, you git- how did you get better at Potions?”

“Oh, er- any chance you are going to let this go?” Harry asked hopefully.

“Definitely not,” Draco replied.

“Well… I had Snape’s old book, and it had notes all over the margins with instructions, or better instructions, at least, for all the potions.”

“What? Why would he give you his old book?”

“He didn’t. I didn’t have a book at the start of term and Slughorn let me borrow it until mine came in, thinking it was just an old copy, so I er… kept it.”

“You just didn’t give it back?”

“Oh, er- well, I may have swapped the cover and given him back my new copy so that I could keep it.” Harry flashed him a guilty grin.

“Seriously? So, you were just cheating out of the textbook all year? That explains so much.” He still bristled a bit at the memory of being outdone by Harry in Potions that whole year, but he was definitely a little impressed at this display of blatant cheating. He’s always thought Harry was too righteous and Gryffindor for that sort of thing.

“But, also, these were just directions? Why did it change your potions so much?” Draco asked as he thought about it more.

“Yeah, mostly, but they would be slightly different, like it would say to add in a counter-clockwise stir every 8 stirs, for example, but the original would just say to stir clockwise, or it would say to cut up the ingredients differently.”

“If those made the potion better, why wouldn’t have those been in the textbook in the first place?!” Draco asked, quite appalled to discover that he hadn’t been learning the best methods all these years.

Harry shrugged. “How would I know?”

“Ugh. That’s so- Snape probably kept this all to himself so that he’d remain one of the best potioneers. But, now this knowledge is probably lost! How much other knowledge do you think he just kept secret that is now gone forever?”

Harry started laughing.

“What?” Draco asked, feeling suddenly self-conscious.

“Are you sure you weren’t sorted wrong? You sound like a Ravenclaw,” Harry said, with a grin.

“If you remember correctly, Potter, _I_ was not the hat stall,” Draco said loftily.

“Did you ever wonder where it considered putting me?” Harry asked mischievously.

“Well, we can assume not Ravenclaw,” Draco replied with a smirk.

“Hey! I’m not stupid!” Harry laughed while hitting Draco’s arm lightly. “Fine, then, I won’t tell you.”

“It was Hufflepuff, wasn’t it? You always did seem a bit soft.”

“Nope, I’m not telling you now.” Harry straightened his Potions essay and reinked his quill.

“Didn’t you need help with that?” Draco asked.

“Yeah, do you mind if I look at what you have?” Harry started to peer over at Draco’s essay, only to have it quickly snatched aside.

“What did the sorting hat say?” Draco asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Oh, that’s just- Slytherin.”

“You do realize that’s not an insult, right?” Draco grinned.

“Yes, fine- alright. You aren’t going to believe me though.”

“Oh, stop with the melodramatics, Potter.”

“Fine. It was going to put me in Slytherin.” Harry looked straight at him waiting for the reaction.

“It was not.”

“It was. It said I would do well there.” He raised an eyebrow at Draco in a challenge.

Draco stared at him, unsure if he was being messed with.

“I asked it not to,” Harry continued, “So, it put me in Gryffindor.”

“What? You can’t just _tell_ the sorting hat where to put you! That would defeat the whole purpose.”

“Well that’s what happened. Now, your Potions essay.” Harry put his hand out and looked pointedly at Draco and the essay in his hand that he was still holding out of reach.

“Alright, fine, but we’re coming back to this at a later date.” Harry laughed and snatched the essay out of Draco’s hand, brushing his fingers over Draco’s as he grabbed it.

“Next time, I’ll tell you all about the time Ron and I snuck into the Slytherin common room to spy on you,” Harry said playfully.

“Oh, come off it, I’m not that gullible.” Draco rolled his eyes.

Draco pulled his Charms essay back out since he’d just given the entire Potions essay to Harry, which he was probably just going to copy in full. Normally, Draco would never let someone copy off him, without a solid bribe, at least—there was risk of him getting caught and certainly no reward on his end—but he didn’t find himself caring so much at the moment.

“So whatever happened to that book? With all the _apparently_ correct information about brewing those potions?” Draco asked, now wondering if he knew the best way to brew _any_ potion.

“Oh, it, er- got destroyed,” Harry answered, not looking up.

Draco felt he wasn’t getting the whole story there, and kept looking at Harry.

Harry glanced up. “Room of Requirement.”

“Oh,” Draco said, feeling some of their previous humor fade away.

After an awkward moment, Harry bumped his knee up against Draco’s. “So, since I am so obviously rubbish at Potions without cheating,” he said with a grin, “are you going to help me, or what?”

“You have my entire essay—that’s not enough?” Draco said, with slight exasperation.

“Well, er- I don’t really understand this part, and I’m not sure if they way I described the antidote is correct based on what you have here.”

“Oh, alright then, let me see what you have so far.” Draco sighed and took Harry’s partially-completed essay, while Harry continued to read through Draco’s essay. Draco realized he was going to have a hard time saying no to Harry, and that he didn't really mind.

Later that evening, Draco curled up on his bed in his favorite, and only, hoodie with his journal. He hadn’t been great about writing nightly for the past week, so he was trying to catch up the journal, wondering if that was weird. It’s not like his journal knew that he’d left something out, but it felt weird to skip over important events, so he dutifully wrote them all down.

He wrote about his pleasant surprise with Luna, his excitement about the project moving forward, his continued frustration at his classmates.

He considered writing about Harry- his feelings were becoming a bit more complicated there. It seemed more and more like they were actually friends, something Draco hadn’t really let himself believe until this past week. But, under all that, Draco felt the beginnings of a very ill-advised crush. He wasn’t sure he wanted to write that last part down. He knew it was a terrible, so he’d been resolutely trying to ignore those feelings. Writing them down felt like it would make them real, something tangible that Draco had to deal with. He decided against it… for now, and moved on to complaining about his classes and the copious amounts of homework he was being given.

He was just about to start in on Transfiguration when his curtain suddenly opened seemingly of its own accord. He violently startled and quickly shoved his journal under his pillow.

Harry’s head suddenly appeared.

“Potter, for fuck’s sake! Seriously, you _have_ to stop doing that,” Draco said emphatically, heart now racing. He sat up straight and rubbed his face with his hands.

“Sorry, sorry! I just didn’t want everyone to see me come in here, you know.” Harry climbed in Draco’s bed, pulled the curtains shut behind him, and finished removing his cloak. Draco took a minute to refresh the silencing charms on his curtains, flushing slightly at the thought of the last conversation he had with Longbottom.

“Are you wearing a hoodie?” Harry’s eyes went wide.

Draco felt his face flush completely. “I- er. Well, if you must know, it’s very comfortable.”

Harry started shaking slightly from the laughter he was trying to contain.

“Oh, shut up! It’s not like you can talk about fashion, with your clothes and your hair,” Draco retorted, waving his hand at Harry’s head, as if to prove his statement.

“Hey- there is nothing wrong with my hair!” Harry said, still laughing. “I’m sorry, just- I never expected you to own a Muggle hoodie.”

“Well, I do. It’s very comfortable.”

“So you said.” Harry smiled wide at him. “I actually know how comfortable they are, I own a couple. How did you even get one?”

“I didn’t have any clothes at St. Mungo’s,” Draco said a bit harshly, “And my mother wasn’t allowed to visit because she couldn’t leave the Manor. So, I was given some clothes out of the donation bin, happy?” He knew he was being defensive, but he couldn’t help it. He was still deeply embarrassed about the whole thing.

“Oh, hey- I didn’t mean to… I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s fine. I kept it because I actually really like it and I know it looks ridiculous on me, but I like it anyways.” Draco stuck his chin out defiantly.

“It doesn’t look ridiculous,” Harry said.

“You don’t have to lie. I know it does.”

“No really, you look… adorable.”

“You can stop making fun of me now,” Draco said, a bit hurt.

“I’m really not,” Harry said and then without warning leaned forward quickly and captured Draco’s lips in a kiss.

Draco’s sat there frozen as his brain short circuited—absolutely nothing making sense any more.

Harry leaned back, looking a little embarrassed.

“What?” Draco asked, dumbly.

“Sorry- I just thought… sorry” Harry mumbled, avoiding Draco’s eyes and looking like he might bolt.

“But. You’re straight,” Draco said.

Harry looked at Draco, surprised, and let out a startled laugh, “Erm- I’m pretty sure I’m not.”

“What?”

“Well, I mean, at least not completely.” Harry’s lips curved into a smile.

Draco’s brain finally caught up, and he grabbed Harry’s shoulders and pulled him forward again quickly.

“Mrpphhh!” Harry exclaimed, as he was suddenly dragged on top of Draco and pulled into a long kiss. Harry’s lips were soft and warm, and Draco was still not even sure what was happening, but whatever it was was wonderful. Draco laid all the way back, pulling Harry with him.

Draco ran his tongue along Harry’s lips until they parted and then deepened the kiss.

It had been so long since Draco had kissed someone, and then it was always out of desperation, teenage hormones running wild. When he would find himself desperate enough, he’d find a boy he could covertly snog in some hidden alcove who would be sworn, or more accurately threatened, to absolute secrecy lest his father found out. This was different, driven out of pure want. No slightly sick feeling in his stomach about being outed or being a disappointment. He could just lose himself in this.

They kissed and touched and nipped and grabbed and kissed for what might have been minutes and might have been hours. Draco finally leaned back into his pillow, breathing heavy. Harry looked gorgeous, lips pink, pupils blown wide, hair an absolute mess.

“Hi,” Draco said softly.

“Hi back.” Harry smiled. He leaned back in and gave Draco another lazy kiss.

“I like your hoodie,” Harry said, with a gleam in his eye.

“Shut up.” Draco said, but his smile belied his words, as he pulled Harry down to capture his lips again.

When they awoke in the morning, Draco found himself very much in a similar position as the last time Harry had spent the night. Harry really did take cuddling to a new level, and Draco was unsure where his own limbs started and ended, and he was pretty sure the sheets had somehow gotten wrapped up in the mess.

This time, instead of panic, he allowed himself to revel in the safe, warm feeling of being held and cuddled in bed. In his bed! He had a cute boy who actually liked him in his bed, and not just any boy- Harry. He felt a smile spread over his lips. He slowly stretched and if he leaned over slightly to smell Harry’s hair, well, who would know?

Draco managed to extricate one arm from Harry’s limbs to peek through the curtains. It looked to be another cloudy day, but he could tell it was still fairly early. He quietly grabbed his wand from his bedside table and cast a _tempus_. They had about an hour before breakfast.

It was Wednesday, so he had Herbology right after breakfast. Draco sighed, the thought of leaving his warm bed that happened to include a very kissable Harry Potter made the idea of going to class even more unpalatable than normal.

Harry started to shift, slowly waking up. Draco felt himself fill with anticipation and a little bit of fear, hoping Harry hadn’t decided that last night was some horrible mistake.

As Harry fully blinked awake, he looked up at Draco and gave him a breathtaking smile. Draco felt himself returning the gesture, happiness and contentment coiling in his chest.

“Morning,” Draco said.

“Morning.” Harry scooted up to get next to Draco and gave him a soft kiss.

“Did you know that you are ridiculous when you sleep? I am quite certain you would give the giant squid a run for its money,” Draco said, eyes full of amusement.

“Is that right?” Harry laughed. “Are you complaining?”

“Absolutely not.”

Harry leaned over and planting another soft kiss on Draco’s mouth and then trailing kisses down his jaw.

“Morning,” Harry said softly next to Draco’s ear.

“I think we already did that.”

“Did we?” Harry smiled into the side of Draco’s neck, leaving another kiss there.

“We have nearly an hour before breakfast,” Draco said.

“Is that so?” Harry’s voice was muffled as he kissed down to the crook of Draco’s neck and back up again.

“I can think of a few things we can do to fill the time,” Draco said, trying to hold his voice steady as Harry did wonderful things to his neck.

“Can you?” Harry asked, slowly kissing that spot right under Draco’s ear that sent shivers through him.

“Mhmm.” Draco pulled Harry on top of him and pressed his lips soundly on Harry’s mouth.

With a start, he realized he should probably refresh that damned silencing charm again and sat up suddenly, knocking his forehead into Harry’s nose.

“Fuck!”

“Shhh!” Draco quickly grabbed his wand. “_Silencio_”

Harry was still holding his nose and had started giggling.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing- you, this, us, you nearly breaking my nose because your dorm mates might hear,” Harry said, shaking with laughter.

“Oh.” Draco wasn’t sure if Harry was laughing at him or the situation.

“Just come here,” Harry said, smiling and pulling Draco down and burying them back under the covers. “We have some time to fill.”

***

“Alright, please get started,” Professor Bissett said as the rest of the students started clearing the room for practice.

As the groups began to clearly form, Draco took a deep breath and made a decision.

“Hi Draco!” Luna said as he approached her.

The two other Ravenclaws that had already grouped off with her shared a look.

“I saw a group over there that needed a third,” the male Ravenclaw said.

“Yeah, we need to make sure the groups are even first, really,” the female Ravenclaw added.

Draco looked around, there were no groups of two, as expected.

“I think I’m fine here,” he replied.

“Luna, don’t you think he should move to another group?” the male Ravenclaw looked pointedly at Luna.

“Why shouldn’t he work with us?” Luna asked clearly.

The other Ravenclaws shared another look and then seemed to exhale in defeat, realizing Luna was never going to join in on their game. They got into position for the practical work.

Several times the two Ravenclaw students attempted to exclude him, but Luna always made sure to loudly and clearly explain that it was his turn. Eventually, they gave up and the rest of the period passed without incident.

When the class was done, Draco felt relief wash over his body. Maybe the rest of the year wouldn’t be so terrible. Maybe it was only one class, and maybe quite a few of his others would continue to be terrible, but it felt monumental. He nodded to Luna in acknowledgement of what she’d done for him and grabbed his bags to head to his next class.

“Draco!” Luna called out from behind him.

He turned to wait for her.

“I actually meant to catch you today. The article came out today, did you see yet?” She pulled a magazine out of her bag and handed it over to him.

“No- That’s fantastic!”

Below the large print of the word “Quibbler” was an image of Hogwarts after the battle and to the side, in bright red letters, it read: “The Suffering Continues.”

Draco quickly flipped to the cover story and read:

_While restorations continue to be completed and the Wizarding community moves on from the grief and turmoil of these past few years, some are still suffering. Hogwarts was not only the location of the final battle, but also a place that much of the early unrest and violence of the war was acutely felt. And, there, the battle continues. Not with hexes and curses, no, in the emotional state of the children that have, in many ways, borne the brunt of this war. There, our children are still reeling from the war._

Draco continued to read as he made his way down the hallway towards his next class with Luna walking slowly at his side.

The article went on to summarize the emotional and mental scars that were left from the war, including testimonials from students at Hogwarts that Luna must have gotten after they had spoken, detailing how they were still grieving or struggling with anxiety from the battle or from being in hiding or captured over the past year.

In the last paragraph, it mentioned that a proposal was being sent to the Ministry to create a Community Mind Health program that could help both the community and the students of Hogwarts. And as a final note, almost as an aside, the article suggested that the reparation money could be used for this project. That was all they needed—it planted the seed of the idea after thoroughly pulling on the heartstrings of the reader about how much suffering was still happening at the school.

“This is fantastic, Luna,” Draco said. “Has Hermione seen this yet?”

“Yes, I gave her a copy this morning.”

“Excellent. Now we just have to wait,” Draco said with a smile.

In the past couple of weeks, Draco had managed to sneak away to the Muggle library in London another two times times to make sure the Muggle research and analysis of precedence was flawless. Going to the library solo had nearly caused a full blown panic attack, but Draco had pulled it together and even managed to click the right little picture on the screen to get to the “info net” where all Muggle information was saved on his first try.

After _many_ revisions of the proposal, they finally sent it off. Now they only had to see how the readers and the Ministry responded after the article. If it worked as planned, there would be an outcrying for the Ministry to help the students of Hogwarts, making it very difficult for them to deny the proposal and still save face.

As he was about to turn into another hallway, he stopped for a second. “Hey, Luna-”

She stopped and looked at him.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, Draco,” she said, her smile growing even wider.

Some time later, Draco dragged himself out of his last class of the day. He was exhausted.

It was only mid-November and the teachers were all behaving as if the students were going to have to sit their NEWTs next week. It wasn’t even the homework, although that was also exhausting, it was the _urgency_ that seemed to fill the seventh and eighth year lessons. Every other class a professor would remind them that they’d better take this seriously because it was bound to show up on their NEWTs. The sustained anxiety was becoming unbearably draining.

“Draco!”

Draco spun around in the crowded hall to see Harry barrelling towards him.

“Hi,” Harry said breathlessly with a wide smile.

“Hello,” Draco replied. He wasn’t sure how he was supposed to behave. He wasn’t sure if they were dating now, or if Harry would want people to know, or if he’d want to keep it a secret. They’d spent a few more nights hidden away in Draco’s bed over the past week, but had never talked about it. Draco had nearly brought it up several times, but chickened out at the last minute every time.

“You heading back to the common room?” Harry asked, starting to walk in that direction.

“Yeah, you?”

Harry nodded. “I have a lot of homework, but do you want to maybe sit together?”

“Sure, that would be great.”

“Ok, great,” Harry responded with a smile.

Harry filled Draco in on his day as they walked the rest of the way back to the common room. Draco listened intently, nodding and responding at the right times, but still felt that odd out-of-body sensation that happens when one just can’t believe their luck.

***

Draco pulled his quill, parchment and ink, readying them on his desk for a long note taking session. Rarely did Professor Babbling do anything but lecture.

Hermione slid into the seat next to him a few minutes before class started.

“Did you talk to Luna yet today?” She asked.

“No, I haven’t spoken to her since Defense last week,” Draco replied.

“She has some good news. Her father wrote her to let her know that they’ve been getting lots of letters in response to the article. Everyone is worried about state everyone was left in, particularly the students here. Also, wizards and witches from all over the country have been sharing their own stories of how they’ve been struggling to recover and how they need help. Luna showed me a few of them that her father sent her—next time you see her, I’m sure she’s show you. Some of them are so heartbreaking. They are going to run a follow-up to the article with all these other stories now too.”

“Really?!”

“This is good. We really have a shot at making this work.” Hermione nodded as she spoke, as if she never doubted it. “Anyway, I just wanted to let you know.”

“Thanks for letting me know. And for all your help- I’m sure I don’t say it enough.”

She looked at him for a moment and then nodded quickly, turning back towards the board, just as Professor Babbling started her lecture.

***

  
“I need to actually get some sleep tonight, Potter,” Draco said, but his smile contradicted his words as Harry climbed behind the curtains.

Harry shot him a grin that said he knew Draco was full of crap. He was already dressed in a long sleeve t-shirt and pyjama bottoms, clearly having no intention of going back to his room that night. He quickly settled himself under the covers, tucked in next to Draco.

“Hi,” Harry said.

“Hi,” Draco replied with a soft smile.

Harry leaned in quickly, capturing Draco’s lips. Draco pulled him on top, letting his hands wander and his hips cant.

He spread his legs slightly to give Harry the room to slip in between them as they moved and pushed and ground into each other.

He still couldn’t believe he got to do this. That he got to kiss and touch and feel. That it was Harry was extraordinary enough, but, that Draco got to have this at all still didn’t feel real. To be with a boy he really liked outside of the crushing expectations he’d grown up with, that he could live in a way that was authentic and honest to himself—it was so monumental he often felt in a daze that this was real life.

Draco groaned as Harry sucked on his neck, and let his hands move under Harry’s shirt, feeling Harry’s muscles move under Draco’s touch.

Draco wanted to feel all of him. He started to gently pull Harry’s shirt off. He lifted up up to Harry’s chest and was about to ease Harry’s arms and head out when Harry pulled back and froze.

“Sorry- is that- was that not alright?” Draco stammered.

“Let’s just… can we just... with our shirts on?” Harry asked, pulling his shirt back down and then pulling the ridged cuffs back over his wrists from where they’d ridden up a bit.

“Sure, of course! I wasn’t trying to… sorry, I should have asked,” Draco said quickly. He was obviously moving too fast, not that he had any reference point for the normal pace of relationships, if that’s even what this was. They still hadn’t actually talked about it.

Harry leaned back in for another kiss, but Draco could feel tension and hesitancy there now. It’s not like Harry had a ton of experience either. Draco realized he should have known to take it slow. Harry probably wasn’t even sure about any of this; as far as Draco knew he was the first boy Harry had been with at all. Gods, he really hoped he hadn’t scared him off.

After a few long minutes, Harry pulled back and tucked himself close to Draco.

“Probably should get some sleep, yeah?” Harry asked, planting a kiss on Draco’s cheek.

“Right- probably a good idea,” Draco replied. He stayed on his back, looking up at the wooden canopy of his four-poster bed.

“Can I ask you a question?” Draco finally asked.

“Erm- sure.” Harry propped himself up on an elbow and looked over at Draco.

Draco hesitated for a moment, gathering his thoughts.

“I can’t help but feel like I screwed up… again. And, I’m- I’m not sure what you want from me, or when I’m moving too fast, or… really, what we are even doing? Are we dating? Are we just hooking up? Is this a secret? We never talk about anything. And, I don’t want to mess this up or scare you away, but I can’t help but feel like maybe we should actually talk about some of these things.” Everything he’d been worrying about for weeks came tumbling out.

At that, Harry sat fully up next to Draco, looking a little alarmed. “Oh, erm… well… I thought we were dating. Are we not dating?” Harry asked, sounding a little panicked.

“Well, I would like to be dating, would you like to be dating?”

“Yes,” Harry said with a smile. “Definitely.”

“Ok,” Draco let out a small relieved laugh. “So, am I- I mean, I am totally okay with going slow, I definitely don’t want you to feel pressured. I’m sorry if I moved too fast earlier.”

Harry fiddled with his cuffs and looked down at his lap. “Oh- erm… yeah, slow is good.”

“Ok. Are we okay?” Draco asked, still concerned at how Harry was acting.

“We’re good,” Harry looked up at Draco and smiled. “We’re definitely good.” He repeated and then leaned over and kissed Draco again.

Draco still had that small niggling feeling that Harry was still keeping something from him, but decided not to press it, letting himself melt into the kiss.

“We should still get some sleep too. Weren’t you the one complaining not an hour ago about needing some sleep tonight?” Harry said, smiling into the corner of Draco’s mouth.

“Oh, fine. I suppose we should sleep,” Draco sighed melodramatically. He turned on his side and curled around Harry happily. “Night, Potter.”

“Night, Draco.”


End file.
